Chosen Insanity
by AmenToTheMangaBible11
Summary: He called us all here because he needed a hit team, and a group of professional criminals fit the bill perfectly, but we were being used for so much more than we had ever expected. We're undoubtedly the best at what we do, even if we are half out of our minds, but that didn't matter much to anyone anyway. We were the test subjects of Chosen Insanity, whether we wanted to be or not.
1. Insanity Don't Choose You, You Choose It

Hey y'all! So, I'm just starting in this new story, and I... really, honestly like it. I have a feeling that some of you will share this excitement to get this whole thing done and ready! Oh, at the end of every chapter, I plan to give you a full character description of 1 of the main characters in the story! Exciting, right? So, not only do you get to read the character in action, you can read why the character is the way they are. And trust me, they're good.

So, I'm still new here on Fan Fiction, but I've discovered that I'm actually becoming pretty popular relatively fast. I'm not sure if I'm just choosing good topics, or if I am just lucky, but either way I'll take it! Just wanted to thank those who actually take the time to read the stuff I write. So, thank you from the bottom of my moderately shallow young heart! Just kidding, I loves y'all!

Just a few key points for this story. So, the character this is listed under, "Naruto", is a bit vague, because, yeah, the story'll be told from his point of view most of the time, but there will be some other, majorly important characters in this story too. So, pay attention to them too! If you come across a character at some point in the chapters of the tale, and you aren't precisely sure of it's use in the story or even if it's just important, here is a small hint.

**Read the character descriptions at the bottom of each chapter in bold! They will tell you if a character is important enough to recognize or not!**

**Disclaimer:** I really don't own Naruto, but I own these AU versions of everybody, 'cuz thems mine!

*Well, on with the show :D *

Chapter 1: Insanity Don't Choose You, You Choose It.

. . . . .

He could feel it coming, the resounding boom just dying to echo in his ears and to reverberate around inside the small concrete room. His grin was impossibly wide as he watched the man across the room from him fall to his knees and swear under his breath once the sound had rung clear in the air. Naruto stood up slowly, his hands beside his head, palms facing forward, before he slowly slid them behind his head and laced his fingers together. He chuckled under his breath at the incredible roar that filled the room. The door opened with a bang, and several young men rushed inside, attempting to slam Naruto into the side of the vehicle that was pulled up in his open garage.

"No way! Man, Naruto, you suck. I've been trying to get my engine running that clean for weeks." Naruto pushed himself off the hood of the navy blue Corvette and wiped his hands off on a grease rag before offering one large palm down to the teenager that was sprawled out on the driveway. "How much do I owe ya this time, Blondie?" The young man brushed his trousers off with his hand before digging into his back pocket for his wallet. Naruto raised a hand to his chin and lowered his eyes to stare down at the shorter male condescendingly, who just blushed under his gaze.

"Call it a hundred and we're even for this and last time too." Naruto held out his hand to the lad and shook his soundly, each party mumbling 'deal' over their clasped hands. Naruto pocketed the bills before turning back to the car and pulling the two skateboards taped together he used to slide under the vehicle out from under the front tire. "Y'all want to get the thing back on the ground? I just spent a half hour under a grease trap in the summer sun. Need I say more?" He watched as his client, a stocky fellow named Choji, and his friends immediately rushed over to the vehicle.

He sat back in the shade that his open garage door provided and drank a bottle of water in one go. He peered up at the sky from under the tip of his black golfers hat and let out a quiet 'tch' before kicking open his minifridge and getting another cold drink for himself.

"Ya know," Naruto called over the hum of his washing machine to the young men struggling with the jack holding up the Corvette, "ya should've come by the shop during store hours instead of waiting 'til _Saturday_ at _noon_ to drive by _my_ house. I could've been doin' something, and where would you have been then?"

"Banging on your front door? For real man, where you gonna go on a Saturday?" The car hit the ground with a loud thunk, and Naruto winced visibly.

"No wonder this car went from new to crap in less than a year." Naruto ran his hand along the newly re-done paint job and smiled, staring at the flawless reflection of his pearly whites and blonde hair.

"It ain't crap so long as you're here to fix it." Choji tugged the door open and climbed into the passenger seat, rolling down the window before the door had even shut. "Thanks again man, you're a life saver." The car accelerated off the driveway, into Naruto's trashcan, and down the street before Naruto could even tell the 16 year old to "Get your fat butt back here and clean up my driveway you reckless idiot". Naruto glanced up painfully at the garbage spilled all over the edge of his lawn, driveway, and even in the street.

"Psh, man. Forget it." Naruto jumped as he ran towards his garage, grabbing the handle on the underside of the door, and slid on the smooth concrete towards the door to his kitchen. The garage door shut with a resounding 'boom' just as he opened the kitchen door and felt the loving slap to the face of the air conditioner. A stupid smile made its way onto his face as he kicked off his work boots and pulled his greasy t-shirt over his head, knocking his hat to the floor.

He walked his way through the familiar rut from the door, to the cabinet for a glass, to the fridge for some ice and a pop, and then to the sofa for his butt. He relaxed back into the plush, obnoxiously orange sofa and kicked his feet up onto the simple coffee table in front of him. He took a swig of the orange flavored soda and scooted over a few inches in his seat to sit directly beneath the ceiling fan.

He nearly fell asleep in the almost quiet room, apart from the whir of the fan and the distant sound of cars driving by outside. "I love Saturdays." The words came out in a sigh of bliss just as his head hit the cushion behind him.

The doorbell rang.

Naruto squeezed his eyes shut just a little tighter and sighed again, this time a bit heavier. "But God knows that Saturdays don't love me." He stood and shuffled his way over to the front door, pulling aside the white curtain that covered the glass. A small smile lit up his face. He opened the door to the little girl that was standing with her hands shoved in her tiny jean pockets and ruffled her hair. He crouched down on his haunches in front of her as she threw her arms around his neck for a quick hug.

"What can I do for you Moegi?" Naruto asked as he jumped quickly to his feet, his hands on his hips. She just mocked his position playfully, putting her weight onto her left foot and placing a finger to her bottom lip. She took a moment to think, and Naruto began to slide the door shut slowly on his neighbor before she cried out in anger at his childishness.

"Naru! No! You're not s'posed to shut a door on a pretty woman. It's mean." The 6 year old cried indignantly. Naruto smiled brightly at her. Moegi handed him a few letters, mumbled something that sounded like a very begrudging 'You're welcome' before spinning around on her heel and jumping down his porch steps one big leap at a time. "You're mail got mixed up with ours again Naru. Bye bye!"

Naruto shot out a casual wave to the little girl before kicking the door closed with his heel. He slunk down the hallway and deposited the small stack of mail on the dresser beside his bed. He pulled a pair of jeans that at least vaguely resembled clean and a t-shirt from his closet before heading for the shower. His phone lit up with a bleep when he walked by, and just casting a glance at the weather update had him groaning in complaint.

"It's gonna be hot as Satan's fire in the ring tonight." The shower door slammed shut.

. . . . .

"Menma! Menma!" The short man swore profusely over the loud din of the bar. He pushed his way through the crowd that was gathered around the mock boxing ring and almost did a double take. He climbed on top of the nearest table top, and dove into the ring, attempting to break up the bloody, devastating mess. Menma stepped back and wiped some of his opponents' blood off on his shirt before laughing at the sight of the small bar owner that was doing his best to drag the unconscious man to the infirmary in the back room.

Menma climbed up onto the rubber-covered steel bars that surrounded the ring and pumped his bloody fists in the air above the crowd in time to cheers of "Menma, Menma, Menma!" God, he felt good.

He stepped down and roared to his audience. "Who's next?! Huh? Who can take on the Demon-Fox?" He stomped a foot for good measure, his steel-toed boots banging loudly on the stage of the small arena. He bounced his weight from heel to toe, his hands behind his back while he waited for his final opponent of the night to climb on stage. Menma slid his left leg behind him, leaning forward in a lunge towards the man that must've been at least six and a half feet tall and nearly half as wide in the shoulders.

The smaller blonde turned his neck until it cracked, then leaned down on his finger tips. 3... 2... 1... The bell sounded with a ring.

Menma ran at the carrot-top giant, leapt into the air several feet in front of the huge man charging towards him, before throwing his weight down to his feet and abruptly sliding under his legs, grabbing him by the ankles, and pulled him down to the ground with his advantageous momentum. He grabbed the man's, Juugo's as the crowd new him by, right ankle and twisted it up behind him until his foot was pressed up against his muscular back. There was a loud pop from Juugo's hip, and the giant cried out in pain. Menma laughed loudly over the cheering crowd, then twisted the leg in his hands until the knee popped, then the ankle.

Menma stepped back from Juugo and watched as the man rose to stand on his left foot, avoiding weight on his obviously dislocated leg. Menma let the man rush him, ducking down to his haunches just before the moment of impact, slid his palms up onto Juugo's chest, and latched onto the man's t-shirt. Menma rode out the flip with the larger man, curled into a tight ball, and waited until Juugo hit the ground with a painful sounding thud.

Menma gripped his opponents' shirt tighter in his fists and settled his weight over the man's neck, his knees pressed into his shoulders. Menma punched once at his cheek with his right hand. Juugo grunted in pain while Menma laughed heartily. He swung again, harder this time, and felt at least one bone shatter in Juugo's jaw. Blood leaked out from between the mammoths' lips. Menma aimed for the nose this time, then the temple, then the eye, and kept going until he wasn't even aiming any more, just brutally attacking.

Juugo tapped his hand on the ground 3 times, the sound lost over the roaring crowd. Menma stood, making sure to step on Juugo's hand as he made his way from the ring. He tore his leather gloves off with his teeth and gave a final cry of victory from atop the drink bar in the room. He gave a bow, jumped from atop the tall surface, and slipped out of the smoky room and into the brightly lit hallway towards his dressing room. His footsteps were heavy in his boots and the leather belt tied tightly around his abs was beginning to chafe from his sweat. He threw open the door with his name written in sharpie across it and stumbled into the room. He kicked the door shut behind him while a crazy grin made it's way onto his face. He kicked his boots off of his feet and shuffled over to the small vanity in the cubicle of the dressing room.

He unclipped the irritating belt from around his waste, managing to remove it without cutting himself on one of the studded spikes embedded in the leather. He untied the drawstring holding the loose-fitting, lightweight pants up above his hips and let them sag down, his orange boxers peeking out over the top.

Menma flipped the handle on the sink up and waited a few seconds for the water to run down through the pipes to his sink. He scrubbed his hands under the relatively clean water and watched the blood swirl down the drain. He shut the sink off once all of the red had faded from his sun-kissed skin and dried his hands with the stained rag on the towel hanger.

"Menma! Great job tonight, I really mean that. Just super, excellent job." The bar owner crammed his way through the door, it having only opened about a foot before jamming.

"At least I didn't kill anybody tonight." Menma smeared the cotton ball across the black nail polish on his finger nails and smiled when the normally stubborn crap came off easily with the remover. 'I guess good people do get blessed every once and a while.'

"Yes! Thank you very much. It's not like anybody missed the guy from last week, but if you'd kept on killing people, eventually someone important would end up finding out."

Menma fixed the short man with a look that clearly said 'What the heck do you think you're talkin' about?' "What kind of important person comes down to an illegal brawl-bar on a Saturday night?"

"Well, we just don't know that 'til we find out. You're paycheck is in the mail, probably got there this mornin' in fact."

"Yeah, I got it, just haven't gotten around to openin' it yet."

"Alright then, kiddo. Shut off the lights when you're done. I don't wanna have to pay for any more bills than I have to already." The stubby man sucked in his beer belly and shoved his way through the door before sliding it shut with a click.

Menma slunk over to his sink and lifted the handle so that it was just barely letting out a stream of water. He chuckled while he pulled off his mask and tugged a shirt over his 6-pack. He shimmied his way into his jeans, shoved his feet into his boots and was out the door in seconds, phone in hand, checking the weather for tomorrow's forecast.

. . . . .

Naruto crept through his front door and slid it closed gently before falling in an ungraceful heap over the soccer ball in front of the door.

"Sure, I can beat up a guy that eats steroids for breakfast, but look at 'The Mighty Menma' being brought down by a," Naruto scooted up to his knees and picked the ball up in the semi-darkness of his foyer, "size 3 soccer ball. Where on earth did I get this dang thing from anyways?" He chucked it over the sofa in his living room and walked quietly down the hall on the left to his room. "4am, huh?" He patted the clock on his bedside table as he sat down on the bed.

A pile of papers and envelopes fluttered down to the floor in a heap. "Sunday's don't like me either, do they?" Naruto slid down to the floor from his bed and gathered all of the papers up, walking back around to the desk up against the wall. He pulled the wooden swivel chair out from under the desk and slid into the seat.

Naruto spread the mail out over the smooth surface, immediately sorting the bills and other crap he didn't want to read into one pile and the other stuff, like his paycheck and a few letters into another. The weekly letter from the local jail updating him about how long he'd been out and exactly how much longer they'd have to notify him about his "progress" went straight to the shredder beside his feet.

Naruto hummed some random song he'd heard on the radio while driving back from the bar while he worked on opening the first letter from his 'I care enough to read this pile' with a pair of broken scissors. He eventually just gave up on a nice and pretty cut and just went straight ahead to tearing the entire front of the envelope off. He tugged the letter from its snug little home inside its packaging and unfolded the thick printer paper.

_To the Uzumaki household, but more specifically, Menma:_

Naruto froze. No one knows my stage name is connected to me, not even my boss knows what my face looks like. His eyes skimmed faster over the page.

_My organization has been watching you for the past several years_.

_Now, Naruto dear, don't get the wrong idea. Here, I actually appreciate what you can do as such a well-rounded man._

_I'd like to extend a personal invitation to you, in the form of an all expenses paid trip to visit my business in Japan._

_Everything will be explained further as soon as you arrive here at my company._

___June 4-11. Plane leaves at 5am on the 3rd of the month._

_I do hope you will join me soon._

_~Sound HQ-Mr. O._

Naruto stared blankly at the letter. One thing coming to mind.

"I better not owe this creep money."

. . . . .

"Alright, alright. Sound. Sound! Ah, here it is." Naruto's grin was illumined by the glow of his computer screen in the darkness of his living room. He clicked on the link on the bottom of the Google search page and waited for his dial-up to load. He took a swig of his coffee and nearly dropped the mug when his laptop 'pinged' loud enough to wake his neighbors up.

"Shhhhh! Okay, so, says here that Sound is a manufacturing company just outside Tokyo, Japan. It's been around for about 14 years now, blah, blah, blah. This doesn't tell me crap about nothin'. What do they want me, or rather, Menma for?" Naruto leaned back from the screen and squinted at the fancy print of the letter, analyzing it for about the seventh time in the past half hour.

"Guess I got nothin' better to do. Maybe I should humor this guy. And if it doesn't work out, hey, free trip to Japan. Get a little closer with at least half of my heritage. It's decided then." Naruto said as he slammed his laptop shut then headed off to pack and hopefully sleep until at least noon the next morning.

. . . . .

End Chapter 1!

And now it's time for your character of the day! Get ready! Okay, scroll down. :)

. . . . .

-Uzumaki, Naruto:

**Age: 18**

**Height/Weight: 6'/210 Ibs**

**Origin: USA/ State of Texas**

**Appearance: Shaggy blonde hair that is parted on the right with sweeping bangs spiked over his left eye; spiked up in layers all over. Tan skin. Blue eyes. 6 whisker-like scars on his cheeks, 3 on each side, born from the "Fox-Demon" incident. Wears orange constantly, claiming that the color "May be obnoxious, but it calms ****Him**** down." Wears a crystal necklace for reasons unknown. Moderately tall, broad shoulders, and slightly above average muscular build. Wears a black band tied around his forehead to keep hair from getting in his eyes.**

**Background: Born and raised in Sherman, Texas. Nothing is known about his early childhood. Left school at age 16 and sought employment while living at local orphanage before getting thrown in prison for causing mass hysteria and several severe injuries in what he claims as a "momentary lapse of sanity" and what others to this day call the "Fox-Demon" incident. Released from prison 6 months after he turned 18, two years after admittance, and turned over to the psychiatric ward of the state due to what was believed to be "Split Personality Disorder" that effected rational thought when faced with anything that shows resemblance to whatever caused initial incident. He was shunned by the town as a demon, so he moved to San Antonio to attempt to start over, despite still enjoying a dirtier line of work. Works part-time as an engineer for a local company. Still does a lot of underground street fighting for fun and profit on the edge of the city. Under surveillance of the local jail and police system for security reasons.**

**Cause of Insanity: Unknown**

**Current Location: Outskirts of San Antonio, Texas**

**Family/Relations: Unknown**

**Personality: Often happy and polite, quick to defend another person, and rarely ever harsh. Compared to a small child in maturity and is kind to even people that spit on the ground he walks on. Determined and loving, yet incredibly stubborn and often foolish and brash. Menma-(street name)-quick to draw blood, unrelenting, and violent. Has murdered on more than one occasion and feels no remorse. Split opposite of Naruto.**

**Special Skills: Excellent hand-to-hand combat, above average marksmanship, average knowledge of weaponry, poor tactical skills.**

**. . . . .**

1. I'd better not be the only one anticipating what's going to happen.

2. They only get better from there folks! I loved developing these characters so much, so I can't wait to see what you'll say about each of them after you read their descriptions at the end of each chapter.

3. Expect another chapter up relatively soon, because I'm kind of favoring this story to my other one at the moment, but if you're reading Dignity of a Criminal, have no fear! I haven't given up, progress is just momentarily slowed!

4. That doesn't sound much better, does it? -_-

5. Anyways, I got the idea for this story at 1 in the morning last night, spent 4 hours writing up and doing all kinds of research to build these characters ('cuz, as I've said, I'm quickly becoming very attached to them) and then spent another 2 and a half writing this chapter and working on revisions.

6. Let me feel the love from all you readers after pulling an all-nighter!

7. To clarify for anyone who might possibly be confused about anything, Naruto and Menma are the same person (for those of you who are fans and watched the latest movie, you'll get this! *wink wink*). Menma is Naruto's stage name while he's doing his shadier work. And if you read the character description above, (yes, above, ye who holds the power of the mouse) then the whole chapter will make infinitely more sense with the alter-ego aspect. Yes, the character descriptions are, in-fact, useful in helping you as a reader understand the reason why these characters are so quirky and interesting.

8. Alright, I guess I should end my ranting here. Wait! What's that tiny voice in the background shouting? One more thing? Oh yeah! Thanks annoying voice!

R & R, because remember, AMB11 loves you! Well, AMB11 loves to see reviews you post anyways, but you're generally included in that, right? ;)

'Kay... I think I'm done now. BYE!


	2. Air Travel Sucks!

So, already back with the next chapter to Chosen Insanity! Let's get the show on the road ;) I hope you're as excited as I am! Don't forget to read the **character description** at the end of the chapter.

This is what happens when you pull an all-nighter then spend the morning typing away in the dark. I just hope you all like it. Enjoy!

Thank you so much for my first reviewer for the first chapter of the story!: **Shadowgirl608**

**Disclaimer: **Out of every single thing written on this page, I only own the rants and the plot, not the original characters. But I will proudly own up to the author's notes! Well... Maybe not proudly.

Chapter 2: Air Travel Sucks

Location: Cairo, Egypt.

"Sir. Sir, I'm sorry but you can't take that on board. Sir! Please, listen to me and stop trying to force your way into the loading gate. This is a private plane." The flight attendant put his arm out as a barricade to block the young teen from getting on his flight. Gaara kept his gaze trained straight in front of him, blatantly ignoring the arm that was desperately trying to hold him back and the wide berth he was getting from the crowd of people around him. He shifted the strap slung over his shoulders and felt the electric keyboard slide down his back to a more comfortable position on his small frame. He tried to walk forward again, only to feel a large hand grab his shoulder from behind. He turned his head slowly, catching a glimpse of a shock of blonde hair on a tall, older male, who appeared to be arguing with the irritating flight attendant.

Gaara nodded slightly to the blonde, who caught his eye before gently nudging the short red-head discreetly towards the loading gate. Gaara walked forward at a rather swift pace, the keyboard that was almost the same size as him bumping against his back with each step. There were a few minutes of peace before he once again felt the large hand on the same shoulder.

"Hey kid, you alright? Flight attendants can be a bit hard to deal with sometimes, huh?" Naruto looked Gaara in the eyes for a moment, eyes skimming over the kanji tattoo on his forehead and all of the piercings that littered his features, before the teen turned his head back in the direction he was originally walking, and set off at a slightly slower pace than before. Naruto crammed his hands into his pockets and let a small smile dust his features lightly. He hastened his pace to catch up to the kid he'd helped at the loading gate and pulled his plane ticket from his pocket.

The small company of two was stopped by a flight attendant at the plane's entrance to see their stamped tickets, and Naruto was immediately let through, yet his much smaller companion continued to just glare blankly in front of him, not even giving the poor young woman that asked for his ticket again a glance to show she had his attention. Naruto waved his ticket in Gaara's line of sight and watched as the ginger's teal eyes widened almost imperceptibly before he slowly brought his hand from inside the pocket of his red pants. He simply lifted the ticket up in front of him, and waited once he'd felt the slight tug on it for the lady to return it to him. He pocketed the ticket yet again, and followed the blonde onto the small, sleek aircraft.

Naruto stepped aside to let Gaara inside first and ducked to follow the teen into the back of the plane.

"You're lucky you're short, huh?" Naruto questioned from behind him. There wasn't even a pause in the red-head's steps until he abruptly paused, turned to his right, dumped his keyboard gently on the floor and then sat down in the farthest seat in the back of the empty plane directly beside the window. Naruto raised an eyebrow at the strange kid before following him to the back and sitting down in the plush seat opposite him after throwing his carry-on into the luggage carrier above his head.

"Want me to get that?" Naruto pointed to the piano at Gaara's feet, and watched the young man's eyes follow the movement, then return to his face in a blatant stare. Naruto was beginning to feel unnerved. "You know, put it up there, out of the way." Naruto pointed to the piano again, then up to the rack above their seats. Gaara nodded. Naruto sighed a slight breath of relief at the release of a little bit of the tension.

Naruto sat back down on his leather chair and fastened the seat belt over his waist, waited while Gaara seemingly did the same a few moments after, then turned to stare out the window and into the desert outside. It was almost depressing. He looked back over to the kid across from him, who had his eyes closed and seemed to be ignoring him.

This was the second stop on his trip, then he was supposed to stay on this plane when they touched down somewhere in Scotland for another pick-up, then a final stop in Tokyo. This was going to be a long flight. Naruto cranked the air above his seat up and crossed his legs in the seat, tugging on his gym shorts to pull them back down to his knees. He untied, then retied the laces on his high tops before settling back to look at the kid sitting across from him. He hadn't appeared to have moved at all during Naruto's fidgeting. Naruto took one look at what the kid was wearing and immediately felt like his was sweating buckets. He'd been in Cairo for maybe an hour, sitting in the incredibly small airport waiting for his loading time, and he'd been all but dying in the heat, and he was only dressed in some Nike shorts and an orange tank-top. The boy must've been wearing at least six different layers of clothing, all black aside from his red pants, and to top it off, combat boots that laced up to just under his knees, which Naruto had to admit that he wouldn't mind owning.

"So what's your name?" Naruto mused aloud, and waited for any kind of response; Gaara didn't even open his eyes. "How old are you?" And again, he received no response. "Do you know what this Sound company wants us for?" Not even a twitch.

'Why on earth do they want this kid? He's just a punk.' Naruto settled back in his seat just as he felt the engine of the plane start and the flight attendant come up from behind his silent companion's seat. She leaned her weight suddenly on his seat, and Naruto saw the boy suddenly jump ever so slightly, put his hand directly below hers above his head, and if the blonde was correct in his judgement, there was the slightest glint from inside his sleeve from something reflecting the sunlight coming from the window beside them. Naruto's eyes widened in shock at the kid's revelation, then turned to the flight attendant, who seemed to be running through a list of flight protocol to the two passengers on board the plane, not realizing the threat on her life or that neither of them was listening to a word she was saying.

Gaara lowered his hand from below the girl slowly, sliding the knife back into it's hidden spot in his sleeve so discreetly that if Naruto hadn't been looking for those exact movements, he'd never have known the kid had a weapon. Naruto's heartbeat slowed down a bit once the flight attendant had left, scurrying very quickly up to the front of the plane. 'Just what kind of kid is this?' Adrenaline was pumping wildly through his body, and he suddenly felt jumpy.

"Would you like to sit with the others?" Naruto turned to look around the back of his seat, surprised to see three young men climbing on board the plane, one of them almost doubled over in the short cabin. The tall one peered over the seats, then sighed heavily and hurried to the back and sat on the other side of the separating lane and folded the arm rest up between two seats before sprawling himself over both, his feet dangling over into the lane.

The man's two companions followed quickly behind, opting instead to choose the seats beside the other passengers. Naruto glanced over them both quickly, giving them a fast once-over as they packed up their belongings and settled into their seats. There was a short brunette that glanced between Naruto and the kid that Naruto still didn't know the name of, and shrugged before plopping down beside the younger of the two and fastening his belt. Naruto briefly registered that his toes barely touched the ground, and his silent seat partner wasn't even close to kicking the dust on the ground, even if he stretched. He suddenly felt like laughing.

Naruto's attention fluttered to the final new addition to the party; an average-height male with an odd hairstyle that was the color of ink and bright red contacts that quickly unnerved him. 'Okay, real pretty, but I feel as if the air conditioning has suddenly become a bit to much with this guy on board.

"You guys talk right? Because I just got off of a 14 hour flight with Snores-a-Lot and the Human-Ice-Block and I'm seriously craving more than an occasional grunt in response." The brunette suddenly said, and Naruto felt an immediate liking towards the man.

"Well, he doesn't, but he did pull a knife on a flight attendant just a minute ago. I'd watch it bro." Naruto said, gesturing to the red-head that, once again, had his eyes closed, arms crossed across his chest.

"Woah, seriously? Hey, kid. What kinda gear you packin' under all that stuff? How are you not dying in this heat?" The brunette asked as he turned towards the teen on his left, grabbing his shoulder roughly. There was a split second of panic as everyone's heart skipped a beat, the knife against the loud-mouth's Adam's apple slid up to his cheek and traced the dark circle under his left eye. Naruto held his breath tighter than the red-head held his latest interest's jaw. He turned the brunette's head from left to right slowly, his greenish-blue eyes sharper than the knife in his hand. He slowly receded back to his sitting position, but kept his eyes trained on the young man next to him.

Naruto cleared his throat quietly. "So, what're your names?" Naruto glanced quickly between the three new travel partners nervously.

"K-kiba." Kiba swallowed roughly before slowly regaining his composure. He folded his hands in his lap, nodded to the man beside Naruto, who simply stared in return.

"Sasuke." The raven haired man said lowly, before casting his bloody gaze over to the man that appeared to be out cold in the seat across the lane. Kiba kicked him harshly in the leg, and they waited for a few moments in silence before a sluggish sounding "Shikamaru" floated over the empty space between them.

"Naruto." Naruto reached his hand across the small space between the seats and shook Kiba's hand enthusiastically, then Sasuke, who seemed almost reluctant to do so.

Kiba jerked his thumb over his shoulder to his small companion. "His name's Gaara I guess."

"How did you-" Naruto started only to be cut off by Kiba's laughter.

"It was engraved on the knife blade." Naruto was quick to join in the brunette's contagious laughter.

. . . . .

It was two hours into the flight, and Naruto quickly learned why Sasuke had slipped earbuds in approximately one hour and fifty-eight minutes ago. Kiba liked to talk. Naruto glanced over to Gaara and quickly wondered how he wasn't bothered by the constant noise, but he hadn't so much has opened an eye in several hours. The turbulence outside the plane was horrendous, jostling the passengers about inside the cabin like a rag. Something inside of Kiba's jacket began howling, and he was quick to try and shush it.

"Dude. Is that a dog?" Naruto asked while pointing at the jacket Kiba was wearing that seemed to have come alive in the past few moments of the flight.

"Yes." Sasuke mumbled from his seat, pulling his earbuds out, wrapping them around his iPod and stowing it in his cargo pant's side pocket. "Stupid thing gets nervous when flying."

"Does not, it's just the wind outside. It's not exactly an easy, smooth flight, now is it Ice Queen?" Kiba taunted, shoving the small, white head with brown, floppy ears back down into his jacket. "Isn't that right, Akamaru?"

"I'm not an Ice Queen, you just annoy me." Sasuke glared at Kiba, but Kiba just returned with a smile.

"We've known each other for 3 days now and this is the most I've heard him talk."

"I like Knife Boy over there better than you, and I have no doubt he's probably thought of at least 11 different ways to kill me." Sasuke raised his eyebrows in Gaara's direction who was staring at the raven haired young man. Shikamaru sat up for the first time, bumped his head on the ceiling, and muttered "Ouch" before spinning his seat around to face the other passengers.

"So, anybody know exactly why we're going to some random company in Japan at personal request?" Shikamaru asked while rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

"Been wondering the same thing myself." Kiba said while scratching the back of his head with nails that Naruto noticed were slightly pointed. Sasuke just shook his head, and Naruto followed suit. They all turned to face Gaara who was resting his head against the window with his eyes closed, then looked at Kiba expectantly.

"Uh uh, bros. I did it last time. I ain't about to die again."

Naruto clapped loudly, once, twice, then three times. "What's wrong with this kid? He understands us, because he was nodding to a few things earlier." Kiba brought his hand out to hover in front of Gaara's face. The boy opened his eyes and turned to look at the three older men looking at him quizzically.

Naruto suddenly grinned. "I've got an idea. Hey Gaara." Gaara didn't acknowledge the blonde. He continued to stare with interest at Shikamaru, who held a suspicious gleam in his eye. "Gaara? Hey, kid!" Naruto waved his hand in Gaara's line of vision, finally got his attention then quickly signed 'Hello' to Gaara in sign language. Gaara's eyes widened just slightly for just a split second before returning to normal.

'What.' Gaara signed back in a smooth movement, the corner of his lips quirked up in a near unnoticeable smile, which Naruto returned with a stunning, megawatt grin of his own.

'I had a foster brother for a while that was deaf, so I had to learn sign back about 11 years ago. I'm a bit rusty though, so, sorry for anything I say wrong. Do you know why we're being called to Japan?' Naruto leaned forward a bit and rested his elbows on his knees, trying his best to read Gaara's response, which he quickly discovered was a long and confusing way of saying 'no' which was probably just meant to give him trouble.

'Well, I guess it could be for individual skills depending on what you all can do. Keep that between us for now though, and you can bring it up when we pick everybody up.' Gaara's hands moved smoothly and silently through the air like a dance, but his almost angry, and obviously natural, expression ruined the overall appeal. Naruto simply nodded to Gaara's suggestion.

"The kids' deaf, heh." Shikamaru said, accenting the end of his statement with a wide yawn and a clear attempt at a stretch in the cramped quarters. "How old is he?"

Naruto quickly signed the question to Gaara, who was a little slow in his response this time. Naruto could practically see the gears turning in his head behind the expressionless mask, obviously contemplating telling him or not. The other men leaned in a bit closer to the silent conversation.

'12. And before you ask, my name is in fact Gaara like dog breath here said, and in response to Duck-butt over there, it's 17 ways, not 11, not including hidden explosives.'

Naruto felt the distinct need to crack up hidden under his shock. '12?!' Gaara just nodded in response. Naruto slumped back in his seat and ran a hand through his blonde locks before turning to face the others in the space. "12." Naruto chuckled out. "And he's got bombs." Sasuke let out a chuckle.

"Told you he was planning our deaths. He's just got that look to him."

"And you don't Mr. Red Eyes?" That earned Kiba a glare from 'Mr. Red Eyes.'

Shikamaru fell back in his seat again after a small awkward pause. "I'm 16, just saying to see if anybody cares."

Sasuke groaned. "You two make me feel old. I'm 19."

"18." The blonde smiled brightly while he signed what everyone was saying to Gaara the best he could.

Kiba was frozen in shock before mumbling out, "24," at which everyone stared at him in shock, aside from the deaf passenger who chose to stare out the window blankly instead. Kiba buried his face in his hands and absentmindedly swung his feet at the ground that he could just barely reach and sighed in shame when most of the company began laughing, Sasuke even adding in a few chuckles. "Yeah, yeah! Make fun of the old, short guy!"

'Hey, Blondie, how tall is the midget?' Naruto almost fell out of his seat at Gaara's rude question. Kid obviously didn't have any manners even if he was finally 'talking' in a sense.

"Kiba, the kiddo here wants to know how tall you are." Naruto relayed the message to Kiba while leaning on the arm rest of his chair.

"5'5"! And a quarter!" Kiba yelled from his seat, throwing a fit, Akamaru occasionally making distressed noises from inside his jacket.

'5'5", that's his height.' Gaara let out what could've very easily been a slight cough, but from the small time knowing the kid, they all suspected was a laugh.

"Well how freakin' tall are you?!" Kiba screamed at Gaara, who just glared menacingly at him once Naruto told him the message. Kiba turned to Naruto expectantly, who had a smirk on his handsome face.

"He said 5'3"."

"Hah! Put that in your juicebox and suck it babycakes!"

"Dude." Shikamaru swung up in his seat, bumped his head again, and swore lightly a few times before facing Kiba. "He's 12."

"I really don't think I should relay that message to him. He might seriously throw you out the window with no regrets." Gaara smirked evilly at Kiba, who all but cowered away in fear.

"Well, if it's any consolation, I'm 6'4"." Shikamaru offered.

"Shut it Brainiac!" Naruto's laughter filled the cabin, Sasuke and Shikamaru chuckling along quietly, Gaara glaring and completely unnerving Kiba. "Air travel sucks!" He rushed to his feet and threw his hands above his head in exasperation, his fingertips brushing the ceiling. "Life hates me..."

This was going to be a long flight.

. . . . .

End Chapter 2! Time for your character :)

. . . . .

Gaara:

**Age: 12**

**Height/Weight: 5'3"/110 Ibs**

**Origin: Africa/Egypt**

**Appearance: Bright red hair that is shorter in the back and longer and layered on top, swept forward and to the right over his forehead, spiked up in back. Blonde, nearly invisible, eyebrows. Blue-Green eyes, heavily made out with eyeliner. Fair skin. Tattoo of the kanji for 'love' on the left side of his forehead. Wears a ton of layers of clothing to cover his skin, yet usually wears only a fishnet shirt under his jackets and wraps. 10, in total, piercings in his ears from the lobe up to the tips, 5 in each ear. Has a piercing that goes through his eyebrow just below his tattoo. Average height (for his age), slim shoulders and slight breadth, athletic build, with precisely chiseled muscle (wiry). Has scars that crisscross all over his back. He is deaf, and wears hearing aids on chain around his neck at all times that hang under his shirt since he believes them to be "pointless" due to the fact he cannot hear at all, but precious enough to wear in some way.**

**Background: Born in Abu Simbel, Egypt. Was part of a royal family in the small town. When he was 3, it was decided he would be a sacrifice to the gods as a peace offering, but when the townspeople sent him to the Abu Simbel temple, one of the stone statues was struck by lightening in the midst of a storm, and caused him to be trapped inside for 28 hours. When he was recovered, many people believed him to have been possessed by a demon while trapped inside the temple because he would not respond to anyone or anything, and had even ceased speaking and often sleeping. He was shunned by the village. He became violent towards those who continued to attempt to heal him by the age of 6, and killed two women with a knife and injured a local holy man. He was sent away by his father to the desert to train in a secret militia service when he showed military promise at the age of 8. He returned to Abu Simbel shortly after turning 10 after murdering everyone at the compound in a fit of rage when several officers took a whip to him in an attempt to rid him of his "possession". He killed his father before fleeing to Aswan to seek medical help. It was later discovered that the explosion at the temple had destroyed his hearing completely, and that he was suspected of schizophrenia (this was later disproved and shown to be extreme anxiety). He was to be admitted to a local hospital. He spent 1 year in Aswan learning sign language, piano and guitar as an outlet for his anger (both of which turned out to be a special talent), and receiving medical care before the city was attacked by a group of thieves passing through on their way to Cairo. The hospital was destroyed along with everything he had known. He killed the group of thieves using stolen explosives before stealing their supplies and leaving everything but his hearing aids, a specialized gift from the person he considered the only friend he'd ever had, Yashamaru.**

**Cause of Insanity: Loss of hearing due to trauma, physical abuse, and torture.**

**Current Location: (Rumored) Cairo, Egypt**

**Family/Relations: -Older Sister (location unknown)-was sold to be a harem girl at age 16 before she disappeared from the convoy she was traveling with. -Older Brother (location unknown)-disappeared soon after Gaara killed their father and is rumored to be selling illegal specialty weapons in cities all along the Nile. Yashamaru (deceased)-personal care-taker for Gaara while he was in Aswan.**

**Personality: Ruthless. He is unable to speak more than a few small words due to loss of hearing at a young age, but is known to hum a few very simple tunes he heard as a child before he became deaf, and is believed to have a beautifully deep voice for his age. He comes across as incredibly rude because he will not look people in the eye when they speak, show any sign of giving you his attention, or give any sign of recognition due to his inability to hear. He never lets anyone know he is deaf as he views it as a weakness caused by his father. He is bitter and resentful of most people, and has an incredibly low tolerance for human interaction. He is often viewed as creepy by most people, and inwardly enjoys getting fearful looks from people older than he is. He has never built a bond with anyone besides Yashamaru, who taught him to play music. ****He is only content when he can play any kind of musical instrument he can lay his hands on.** He rarely sleeps due to his mistrust of everyone, and is generally unhappy with everything. He feels no remorse and will not hesitate to kill on site.

**Special Skills: Blade master, above average hand-to-hand combat, explosives expert, poor long distance fighting, and average tactical skills.**

**. . . . .**

1. Normally, Gaara is my favorite character no matter what, but I'm actually very proud of this version of him. Please please please tell me what you think about his development for the story!

2. Soooo... Random useful skill that Naruto pulled out of a hat from back when he was between homes as a kid. I mean, everybody has got moments where something from 11 years ago actually comes in handy right?

3. Next chapter, be prepared for some more character development!

4. Short Kiba?! Random thought, but with that kind of personality, how can you NOT make some obvious thing about his character that will get him seriously worked up around other guys? I've gotta have some fun.

5. Alright, this chapter was actually pretty fun to write, what with all of the interactions, and I'm trying my best to keep the guys in character and also play everything along with my little twists and quirks. Please let me know how I'm doing!

6. Who do you think will join the group in Scotland on the way to Japan? Make a guess, and if you guess right, I'll send you that characters' profile ahead of time so you can get a sneak peak of the insight of the character! You only get **one try.** Bribes galore!

Well, just remember that AMB11 loves you, and that's why you got two really long chapters all before lunch time. R & R! And recommend to your friends :D


	3. So, What Do You Do?

Alright, I actually don't have much to say right now aside from "I'm seriously gonna cry 'cuz no one is reviewing or even reading this story, and I'm so passionate about it. It gets better from here, trust me, and no one is paying it any attention." Phew, now that I've said it, I can go cry in the corner while I wait to even get 30 views of this story.

Would SOMEBODY tell me what I'm doing wrong since no one seems to be interested in this story despite my absolute love for the characters and plot? Oh well...

To make this easy when Gaara and Naruto are 'speaking' to each other, it will be in the 'single marks.' Helpful?

**Disclaimer:** I'm too sad about how no one loves me to do any kind of bad puns about me not owning Naruto... hey, yeah you! Don't cheer for that!

Chapter 3-So, What Can You Do?

"Dude, doesn't that hurt?" Kiba asked, staring intently at Sasuke.

"No."

"It looks so weird, because, you're like digging around in there for it. Okay, ewwwww!"

"Well, don't watch you idiot!"

Naruto leaned his chair back and dimmed the light above his makeshift bed. Sasuke put his contact case away inside the cup holder of his armrest, blinked a few times to clear his vision, then smacked Kiba's hand away from his contacts, throwing in a glare for effect. Gaara rolled his eyes when Kiba dove for it and was promptly kicked in the jaw by Naruto.

"Sorry bro, reflex. Like gagging." Naruto opened his mouth wide and pointed his index finger down his throat in emphasis of his very bad joke before flopping down face first on his seat. Kiba kicked his rear end from across the seat, and laughed when the blonde jumped so high that his head hit the roof. Gaara unbuckled his belt for the first time during the flight, stood on top of his seat and pulled his keyboard down, then walked into a room in the very back of the plane.

"Sir! I thought I told you that you couldn't take that on the-" The flight attendant's voice abruptly cut off and the curtain rustled before the back cabin grew eerily quiet.

"Pssh, she was annoying anyway." Kiba waved his hand dismissively in the air before turning back around in his seat.

"I choose to believe he's in the bathroom doing naughty things with the flight attendant. Who's with me?" Shikamaru asked from his seat, that he was currently spinning around like a child in a desk chair, his head on top of the back, his high set ponytail a little ruffled.

Gaara slid the curtain open just enough for him to squeeze through then slid it delicately shut behind him. He'd taken off a few layers, that was for sure. He crossed back over to his seat, his pants tied tightly on his hips and his shirt made of a knitted-mesh material. He'd tucked his pants into his boots and undone the laces, leaving them just tucked loosely inside. His keyboard was slung across his back.

Naruto shot him a questioning look and just received a blank stare in answer. "Back to the even more silent type."

"I dunno, maybe the kid's just tired." Shikamaru stopped his spinning to pull his cell phone out of his pocket to mess around with the gadget. Gaara jumped the back of his seat and slumped down into it, flinging his keyboard around to rest on top of the arm rests of his chair.

"This guy's ripped for a little fellah." Kiba looked almost like he wanted to pinch Gaara's cheeks.

"Be glad that he can't hear us. I think you'd die first."

"Can he seriously play that?" Shikamaru peered over the top of his iPhone's screen to the red-head.

'Can you play?' Naruto asked Gaara in a few smooth movements. Gaara's fingers slipped over the keys like liquid, an ancient Egyptian lullaby was his first choice for the night. Gaara watched his fingers carefully, counting rhythms in his head, his eyes glued to the keys.

"That's beautiful man, wish I could do something like that. I failed recorder class in elementary school." Naruto closed his eyes and listened as the short song came to a close. He cast a side glance to Sasuke, Kiba, and Shikamaru. "He can't hear this guys. He's one of the best players I've heard."

"Yeah, well... He obviously enjoys playing since he carries that thing around with him. Guy must never have to do core training. Imagine how heavy it'd get just lugging it around." Gaara continued playing quietly, almost idly while he stared out the window to the darkness of the ground 10,000 ft below. "Well, we all know that Maestro over here likes knives and things that go boom, and if they brought in a kid that's this dangerous, I can only guess what the rest of you can do."

"Oh boy, story time!" Naruto got down on his stomach and put his head in his hands, looking between the men giving him strange looks. "You go first Shika."

They all turned to Shikamaru expectantly, tuning Gaara's idle playing into the background pleasantly. Shikamaru sighed, mumbled a "so not worth my time" before holding his cell phone up in front of his face. He counted down, his voice slow and dragging. "3... 2... 1... Go." He tapped his thumb on the screen.

The entire plane went down. The lights shut off, the engines failed, and the entire cabin was sent into a free fall somewhere over land. Shikamaru calmly watched his new acquaintances panic, even Sasuke and Gaara looking a little ill and worried.

"Tap your button! Tap the button!" Naruto yelled, hanging on tight to the armrests at his chair in an attempt to not fly out of it. Shikamaru tapped his screen again, and the plane instantly leveled out, and everyone started to breathe again. Shikamaru smirked, then pulled out his laptop.

"Give me 2 minutes." He clicked away on the wafer-thin computer, occasionally dragging the mouse around the screen. Exactly 47 seconds later, he pointed out the window of the plane with a pleased smirk. "Watch."

They all crowded by the windows, staring down at the completely dark ground below them. "What are we-" Kiba shut his mouth when what looked like a fortress or a prison below them suddenly lit up bright as day in red lights, extremely faint sirens drifting up to the fliers. Shikamaru pressed the space bar, and his audience watched as the ground grew dark again. "Sweet! Gimme that!" Kiba snatched the laptop from the smug looking young man who had begun spinning again.

Kiba pressed the button repeatedly, saying, "On, off. On, off. On, off," in a humorous tone.

Sasuke pulled it from his grip and tossed it back to Shikamaru, calling Kiba an idiot the whole time, while Kiba pouted at his toy being taken away. "Alright, fine."

'Duck-butt goes next.' Naruto cracked up laughing at Gaara's comment, which judging by the glare that could've made Satan repent aimed in his direction, wasn't meant to be a joke. "He says Duck-butt goes next." Naruto waggled his eyebrows at Sasuke, who actually looked offended by the comment against his hair. Naruto dug a bag of peanuts from his jacket pocket and attempted to open them, failing miserably.

"It gives me less of a headache when I do it on stupid people, so Kiba look at me." Sasuke grabbed Kiba by the chin, staring directly into the older man's eyes, then a slow smirk crept onto his face. "Play dead, doggie." Kiba fell from his chair to the floor in the aisle, still as the grave except for the occasional rise and fall of his chest.

"You couldn't have done that several hours ago?" Sasuke clapped his hands together quietly once, and Kiba sat up quickly with a snort, wiping the strand of drool from his lower lip that had been leaking to the ground. Naruto bit onto the pack of peanuts and tried to tear it, feeling it start to slowly pull open.

"My turn?" Kiba rubbed his eyes sleepily and he stood and stretch in the aisle. Naruto's peanuts shot out of the bag when it suddenly wrenched apart. The audience of four watched in sudden awe when Kiba shot each and every one before they could even make it too high in the air, with a gun he'd had concealed somewhere on his person. He lowered the smoking gun, barely even a sound in the plane as the sounds of the muted gunshots faded in the cabin. Kiba flopped down into his chair and crossed his legs.

"I wanted to eat those." Naruto looked heartbroken, but turned to Gaara. 'Okay kid, show us what you got.'

'Tell Ponytail to kill the lights and nobody move a muscle.' Gaara leaned back in his chair and stretched his arms while he waited for his order to get through to the others. The lights were off in a matter of seconds. Gaara held up a a small, hand-held remote in the dark and pressed and held a single button down. Small red lights flashed from every nook and cranny inside the plane, before they all turned a bright green. There was a slight swish of air moving, then the lights turned back on. Gaara's smirk turned sinister.

Senbon needles surrounded each and every person in the cabin aside from himself in a near perfect replica of how they were sitting. It took them just a few seconds to remove the weapons from the seats.

'I like to watch them bleed.'

Naruto scooted a little farther away from the boy, who at the moment could've scared the living daylights out of Dracula with his smile. "I'm not translating that. Alright! It's my turn." Naruto jumped to his feet in the aisle, dragging Sasuke from his seat. Naruto settled his weight on his toes, then shifted his left leg behind him.

"Rush me." Sasuke charged at Naruto in a very convincing attack. Sasuke was on the ground in seconds in a camel clutch hold, doing his best to tap out. Naruto got off of the smaller man then stepped back and offered him a hand up, which was ignored with a scoff. Naruto rolled his eyes good-naturedly.

"Remind me not to piss you off, got it?" Kiba spun around in his seat, his feet hanging over the back and his head hanging down to the ground. "We get you can wrestle, but is that it?" Naruto looked at the bars holding his bag above his head. He pulled his bag down and dropped it in Sasuke's lap. He drew his fist back and prepared his bare knuckles.

"Woah, Naruto, man. You don't need to punch that, you'll just break your-" Naruto let loose with a shout and watched as the metal bent inward under the great force with a loud bang. Naruto shook his hand out and popped his knuckles.

"Toss me my stuff, I think I've got another bag of peanuts in there."

"I don't know whether I fear the killer kid, the hypnotist, the lazy genius or the psychotic inhuman blonde the most. I'm gonna lock myself in the bathroom to sleep."

"You really think a lock can keep me out?" Shikamaru said patronizingly.

"By the way, can you break into a Swiss bank, Shika?"

"Been there, done that."

"I'm impressed bro."

"Shocker."

"Shut it Duck-butt!"

. . . . .

"I don't like you." Kiba stared down at his outstretched hand awkwardly before withdrawing it slowly from the man in front of him.

'I like this guy, even if he does look gay.' Gaara and Naruto were standing off to the side of the group, all of them taking a break from the plane at the airport in... well, wherever they were.

'Why are we picking up an Asian guy in Scotland? That makes no sense.' Naruto laughed at Gaara's comment. At least the kid would 'talk' to him when it was just the two of them. Naruto could see the two of them even being friends if the kid would ever think about something other than how to kill a person in different situations.

He was tall, not nearly as tall as Shikamaru, but closer to Naruto in height, and build; a fighter's build, well if not for the feminine haircut. The young man bowed shallowly to Shikamaru and Sasuke in a grudging respect, ignoring Kiba completely, before catching sight of Naruto standing off to the side. He stuck his hand out to him, which Naruto shook roughly in greeting, smiling when he saw Kiba pouting behind the newcomer.

"Neji."

"Naruto." Naruto clasped Neji's forearm after he'd introduced himself in a show of equal strength. Neji released the blonde's arm then climbed the steps up into the plane to drop off his bag.

'It's nice to be respected isn't it?' Gaara smirked up at the tall blonde, who ruffled the thick red hair before promptly running away in fear for his life, a senbon already lodged in his left shoulder before he'd even gotten three steps.

. . . . . .

"So,what do you do?" Kiba scooted even closer to Neji, who was attempting to meditate in the seat beside Shikamaru, who had immediately rushed for the window seat, leaving Neji to his own resources when dealing with the brunette.

"What... I do?" Neji narrowed his eyes. "I swear, if that's another one of your jabs at my sexuality-"

"No, no! I swear. What's your specialty." Neji jabbed Kiba in the center of his chest, then a few rapid points around his torso so quickly that they had a hard time following his hand's movements. Kiba slumped to the floor unconscious, and Neji returned calmly to his seat.

"Gentle Fist martial artist?" Shikamaru questioned without glancing up from his game of Angry Birds.

"Hn."

. . . . .

End Chapter 3! Ready for your character?

. . . . .

Uchiha, Sasuke:

**Age: 19**

**Height/Weight: 5' 10"/180.5 Ibs**

**Origin: UK/ Ireland**

**Appearance: Black hair that is gelled up in the back in short spikes, with bangs, that end just below his chin, parted slightly off-center to frame his face. Fair skin. Ebony eyes, yet is often seen wearing red contacts. Has tattoo on the left side of his neck consisting of 3 tomoe in the center of black flames that spread down his shoulder. Tattoo of Uchiha family symbol (Fan) on his right pectoral, claiming it to be his "badge". Wears bandages on his arms to cover scars from failed suicide attempts.  
**

**Background: City of birth unknown. Graduated High School in top percentile. Went to Harvard Law for a single year in preparations to run world-renowned Uchiha Corp. after graduation. Family murdered by Uchiha, Itachi (brother) while studying overseas. Cleaned out father's bank accounts and went into hiding in Texas for several months under a foreign name. Was arrested for smuggling guns without a license and was put under parole for 6 months. Arrested a second time for assaulting a man from Scotland that he claimed to be his brother who was trying to murder him. Man had no blood relation, although he did resemble Uchiha, Itachi cosmetically. 6 failed suicide attempts while behind bars and 12 failed homicide events he was suspected of. Escaped from prison by hypnotizing a guard after a month of his 2 year sentence and disappeared in New Mexico.**

**Cause of Insanity: Believes his brother is out to murder him after the death of his entire family w/o any refutable proof of this suspicion. Paranoia**

**Current Location: (Rumored) Tucumcari, New Mexico.**

**Family/Relations: Older Brother (Location unknown)-on the run after the murder of his entire family except his younger brother, who is rumored to be his next target.**

**Personality: Harsh and unforgiving. Trusts no one but himself, and is rumored to talk to himself in place of a different person due to lack of good people skills. Knows how to use words and his looks to get anything he wants, and is considered a ladies' man, yet is known to despise women that flock to him. He will help someone when it benefits himself in some way, and is considered a bit of an "Ice Block" due to his standoffish nature.**

**Special Skills: Advanced marksmanship, Average Tactical Skills, seduction, and Hypnotism.**

**. . . . . .**

1. Haha, Sharingan with all it's powers with Genjutsu! Made him into a hypnotists. How clevah!

2. I don't really have much to say this time around, except that I'm proud that I put out three chapters in this story today.

3. Final filler of the beginning. Plot comes into play next chapter! Look forward to it :)

4. This chaptah short...

R & R, Love AMB11!


	4. Sound

Hey guys! I'm really sorry about the wait for this, but I've been working on a few other things. So yeah, I hope that you've all been waiting to finally find out the purpose of all of these guys to get called to Japan. At long last, right!

I got a question about why the line-up is only males, but there is a reason for that. I hope that the beginning of this chapter confuses the fool out you and makes you want to wait for the next part. The second part explains what's going on a bit, and even introduces a majorly important person for the story. Enjoy!

One last thing, I'll be available to become a beta-reader in just a few days, so if anyone is looking for one, I'll put it up when I'm eligible. I hope that you'd think of me when you were looking for one, since I get a lot of compliments on my writing style and few number of mistakes when I put a chapter out. It's never perfect, but it's as close as I'll get! I'll put it in my next update when I'm available, so keep me in mind fellow authors!

**Disclaimer: **

Naruto: Woah man, put the gun down.

Kiba: Why? It's not like I'm going to miss.

Naruto: That's why I'm worried! You're pointing it at me!

Kiba: Well, you were trying to get me to say that AMB11 doesn't own Naruto. Wait... Crap!

Naruto: Haha! I win!

Kiba: That's it, I'm shooting!

Naruto: AHHHHH! *Runs away*

* * *

Chapter 4: Sound

Screams reverberated down the halls; pleas for God were heard by every prisoner. The voice, she believes, was of her neighbor, and the rattling of chains was most definitely not him moving to the bars to get his meal. The smells of sweat and urine hit her nostrils, causing an involuntary twitching of her eyebrows. The cloying stench had been clogging the air like fog for days, always making her feel light headed and clumsy. Even when she was called to relieve herself, she'd always lean on the man next door, but her support had finally vanished, it seemed.

Footsteps marched heavily down the corridor, the smell of soap cutting through the sickening air; the light from the doorway burned her retinas. She shut her eyes, biting her already scabbed lip, and pulled her legs tighter to her, effectively cutting off entry into her personal space in case they decided to pay a visit to her cell. She scratched at the cross, long since painted and partially peeled, buried under a layer of dirt and dust, and uttered a prayer under her breath. There was a loud bang from next door, followed by a thud, and a slamming gate. The sweet, metallic scent of blood replaced that of the perfumed soap, and then all was silent again once the footsteps had echoed out into the hall.

Hinata closed her glistening opalescent eyes and wiped at the grime that coated her pale cheeks and shuffled closer to the bars. She whistled quietly into the miserable prison, and waited for anyone that was still alive to whistle back. It was silent for a few moments as the other women behind bars woke up or simply waited to make sure it was safe to respond. One whistle after another echoed quietly in the stone corridor between the prisons lined up along the wall in a hypnotic song, one voice blending with another faultlessly. Hinata counted each voice as it rang, made it to four, not counting herself, and knew that only the original five that had been brought here were still alive.

Hinata watched as a shock of pink squeezed through the bars of the cell across from hers, the young girl falling to the ground once she'd escaped the bars holding her inside. The young girl picked herself up off of the ground and scurried over to the cell beside hers, helping pull the older blonde through the bars.

"Sakura, Ino!" Hinata pushed herself into the corridor, covering her face when the light seeping in through the window at the end of the short hall burned her retinas. She crept through the inky darkness, ignoring that with every step she took, her bare feet splashed through some unknown liquid that reached up to her ankles in some spots on the uneven floor.

She jumped when a hand touched her bare arm, but relaxed when she turned to the brunette that was trying her hardest not to fall to the ground smiled at her and continued to use her arm to steady herself. The loud noise of draining water filled the silence when the four of them met in the center of the long room and latched onto each other's arms to hold themselves up in the current.

"Where's Temari?" Sakura's pink hair was tied back with a strip of cloth torn from her shirt.

"She wasn't feeling well yesterday. She's probably asleep." The brunette on Hinata's left spoke quietly, but her voice was loud enough to be heard over the sound of rushing water. Tenten blinked her brown eyes owlishly when a bit more light flooded the room in a flash, and ducked her head so that the matted-brown waves that cascaded down her back would block the sun.

Hinata relished in the friendly human touch of another's hand in hers, tears wanting to break the barrier and run down her face, but she blinked them back behind the gate and stood strongly with the other girls in front of her. Ino shared a small story of her old town that she was planning to return to when they got out, and that she would want all of them to go with her. Hinata whispered another prayer under her breath when everyone else had grown quiet.

"May someone find us soon, and keep us safe until we go." Everyone whispered a conjoined 'Amen' before lowering their heads in respect. A drunken song spun into a melody none of them had ever heard, the words in a language they didn't understand. The pitch was nearly perfect, but the occasional sob that would break through a note fought hard to ruin the melody of the feverish young woman.

Ino, Sakura, Tenten, and Hinata faced each other in the gloom and released each other on a silent count of three, and hurried back to their cells. Temari sang from her cell, laying sprawled across the wooden plank that was in each prisoner's room to keep them out of the water that ran continuously across the floor. Her voice carried the Egyptian lullaby throughout the stone room, locked inside with the five girls that had been taken. Not a single girl bothered to wipe the tears when they fell at the sound of her voice as it spun a beautiful web in the darkness of their prison.

Hinata whistled quietly when a melody repeated in the song, the other girls quickly joining into the haunting song.

"Quiet in there." The voice seemed confused, as if he didn't want them to stop, but still told them to anyway. Their guard was never harsh, so when the girls continued in their song from the other side of the door, Itachi let them with no argument, and sat back and listened as the prisoners sang their fear away.

* * *

"So, who's that guy?" Naruto slung his carry-on over his shoulder as the young man made his way out of the back of the plane, his sunglasses glinting eerily when he turned his head to look at the blonde. The brunette put his hands in the pockets on the back of his jeans and exited the plane quickly.

"Who knows?" Kiba packed his headphones into his bag and zipped Akamaru into his second carry-on, leaving just a bit of it open for the dog to breathe. "I'd rather know how long he's been here, but we're not likely to find out. Why is everyone here a freak?"

The two noisy individuals made their way to the unloading dock to meet up with the rest of the people they'd traveled with, ignoring the pack of girls in high school uniforms following them around. Naruto dumped his stuff to the ground and stretched his back, groaning pleasantly when it popped loudly.

"So, what's your name Shades?"

"Shino." Naruto nodded when he realized he wasn't going to get more of an answer.

"You know us, right?" Shino just nodded. "Alright then, saves us the effort of introduction. Before I make myself feel really stupid, I'm not the only one that sees the pack of little girls stalking us, right?"

"Nah, they've been following us since we got off the plane." Shikamaru leaned back against the scanner behind him and yawned loudly. "Guess we're popular here. That or the fact that we look like giants is freaking them out. Well except for the kid, Shorty-McGee, and Red Eyes." Sasuke glared at the tall teen, and turned when he heard a loud squeal from behind a row of chairs and someone speaking in rapid Japanese.

"Should I be glad I don't speak Japanese?" Sasuke got his bag off of the luggage carrier and hurried after the group when they were called for at the door by a taxi driver.

"Depends, do you care about girls thinking about what they'd wish you'd do to them." Neji loaded Sasuke's bag into the extremely large taxi, a yellow limo practically, and shut the trunk. Sasuke groaned in irritation at the humorless joke and pushed Naruto into the seat of the taxi so he could get inside himself.

"Hey, where's the kid?" All of the men packed into the vehicle froze. "Crap, don't tell me we lost him." Shikamaru bumped his head when he sat up too quickly. Sasuke, Kiba, Naruto, Shino, Shikamaru, and Neji stared at each other for a moment.

"Why are we so worried about this? If he's here I'm sure he can take care of himself." Neji pushed Naruto over a bit to make more room for himself between the blonde and Sasuke as he spoke. Shikamaru tucked his legs as close to himself as he could to keep from kicking the long-haired brunette across from him, elbowing Shino and Kiba in the process.

"He's a twelve year old, he's deaf, and he's armed in a foreign country." Kiba whispered the last part in case their driver spoke English.

"It also looks like he called shotgun." Shikamaru stretched his neck to look up into the front seat where the driver was babbling on to the small red-head in Japanese, who looked like he was too small to even ride in the front of the vehicle, his feet not touching the ground below him.

"So not cool kid." Kiba scratched at the tattoos on his cheeks, his words carrying the message that every older male in the vehicle had secretly been thinking.

* * *

The car pulled up to the gate in front of an enormous, industrial-looking building and halted while the gate slid open. Neji peered out of the window and whistled. "Big place."

"I wonder if this is where we're going to be staying. It looks like a factory." Shikamaru kicked his feet up into Neji's lap absentmindedly and put his arms on top of the seat behind Kiba and Shino, ignoring the three glares aimed his way.

"Creepy lawn gnome they got though." Kiba pointed to the man standing outside the grand entrance to the building. He had long black hair that put even Neji's to shame, reaching the small of his back. His eyes were an eerie green, outlined with excess amounts of purple eye shadow and black eye liner. He was wearing a typical business suit, the tie hanging loosely from his neck and several buttons undone on the front of his shirt, revealing more of his almost sickly pale skin. He smiled as the car pulled up, and swung his arms wide in greeting.

The car skid to a stop at the end of the long drive way, and the creepy man paid the driver when he exited the vehicle. The group piled out of the car and unloaded their bags quickly before the man hurried over to them, his spine-chilling smile still sitting on his face.

"Welcome! I'm Orochimaru, the head of Sound Inc. It's an honor to have people as talented as you come at my request, and it pleases me that all of you accepted the invitation. Let's go inside to finish this, then. I'll have people come collect your belongings." He spoke with a thick Japanese accent, a few of his words sounding strange to the people that spoke English as a native language. Orochimaru ushered the men inside of the building, and immediately through the factory part of the building and back to an area that seemed to have been newly renovated. They filed down a long hallway, Orochimaru leading them into an impossibly large office on the left side of the hall and shutting the door behind them.

"Nice office Mr. O." Kiba plopped down on the snakeskin couch that was up against the wall, Gaara sitting down beside him soon after and kicking his boot-clad feet up onto a very expensive looking glass table.

"Why are we here, Orochimaru?" Sasuke leaned against the door of the office and focused on the odd-looking man that was shuffling a few papers on his desk.

"To be blunt," His voice lost the humorous tone, "You're all the best at what you do and willing to do anything, and I need you to do a few jobs for me."

"We're here to be hired help? No way." Naruto sat on the edge of a table that had an ancient vase sitting on it and crossed his arms across his chest.

"No, of course not Uzumaki-san. You won't be working for money, and the people you'll be taking out are all people that are trying to smuggle in on my business or destroy my company without getting caught by the law." Orochimaru clicked a button on a remote and a screen slid down behind him. Sasuke hit the light beside the door just as a slide-show flickered to life on the screen.

"Movie time boys." Kiba threw his arm over the back of the couch, but pulled it back slowly when Gaara glared at him.

"Now, I've written most of this out on the screen for Sabaku-san, but if you would help me out Uzumaki-san and translate a few things for me."

"Sabaku? Oh! The kid? Yeah, sure, but how'd you know I could-"

"I did my research on all of you Uzumaki-san. I'd never hire some random thugs to protect my place of business. Now, down to business. I've paid for all of you to come out to Japan, and considering you were all over the world, it wasn't cheap." Orochimaru paused until he had everyone's attention before continuing. "Thank you. You all are incredible at what you do, and you're all driven by some sort of goal. I will be able to help you achieve these goals in exchange for your assistance." He clicked to the first slide on the screen, the green light lighting up the entire room in an eerie glow.

It was a graph of what looked like business sales. "Sound Inc. is one of the largest manufacturing companies in the world. We distribute different types of weapons all over the world, mainly supplying large militia services, and quite a few underground clients in countries like Russia and smaller countries in Asia. Lately, I've had a few other companies from these smaller countries try to sabotage my business and cause an incident." The screen changed to one of a mugshot picture of a man with piercings all over his face and hair dyed the same orange as Naruto's jeans, then to another of an albino man with eyes the color of Sasuke's contacts and white hair, and finally to a group photo of three people; one a man with green hair and incredibly tan skin on one half of his face, the other side as pale as the white's of his eyes from what looked like a burn; another man that looked exactly like Gaara aside from the piercings and tattoo, and the third a man with a hood covering black hair and tattoos of what looked like stitches crossing scars all over his face, his eyes an incredible shade of green.

"These are the people trying to get me to shut down, and start a war between Japan and several other countries in the eastern hemisphere at the same time. They want to get rid of the competition and then supply the war themselves from their smaller businesses through underground weapon dealers. I want to hire you all out to form a team to attack these companies when they strike, and destroy their businesses permanently in a way that appears to be an accident to keep myself from legal action. In turn, I will offer you protection from the law while you are here, since most of you are on the run or being watched by the government currently. After my company is safe, you will get your reward and I'll return you home safely."

"You said you know what our goals are. How are you going to help each of us get what we want?" Neji clenched his hands into fists and crossed his arms across his chest. He narrowed his pale blue eyes at the grinning snake in front of him.

"Oh, well either a lead that will take you to what you want." He glanced at Neji and Sasuke. "Or maybe some information about a few things from the past that may have ruined you." His made-up eyes peered at Naruto and Kiba. "Where somebody important is, perhaps." Gaara glared at the man when Naruto relayed the message. "Or maybe just payment for those of you who want to be here." Orochimaru smirked and leaned back in his chair when Shino nodded almost imperceptibly and Shikamaru eyes sparked with interest.

"I'm in. If this guy's protecting me from the law for the time being, I can actually stay in one place for a while." Kiba scooted to the edge of the couch and leaned his elbows on his knees while he looked at all of the people he'd met just days ago. Shino nodded in agreement, just the slightest dip of his head.

"It does sound like a good idea. We do a few jobs, avoid a war, and get paid to do it. I've been looking for a good mental exercise for a while anyways. Life's been pretty boring lately." Shikamaru crossed his long legs in front of him and leaned back in the arm chair, the front two legs coming up off of the ground. Sasuke and Neji nodded simultaneously, but otherwise remained lost in thought. Naruto closed his eyes and considered the offer.

He knew that the government was watching him, keeping track of his every move. It's all because he lost it so long ago. He's the way he was now because of that, and he still wasn't sure what happened to cause his alternate personality and incredible strength to appear, but this man that he'd never met held promise in telling him exactly what happened if he just did a few dirty jobs.

"I'll do it." Naruto looked to Gaara, the last to answer and asked him if he was interested. Orochimaru turned to him expectantly along with the rest of the newly formed team.

'I'm here aren't I?' Naruto smiled.

"He's in."

Orochimaru clapped his hands together and smiled again. "Welcome to team Konoha then!"

. . . . . .

End Chapter 4!

Time for your character.

. . . . . .

Hyuga, Neji:

**Age: 22**

**Height/Weight: 6'0"/225**

**Origin: Asia/Bhutan**

**Appearance: Long, brown hair that is loosely tied in a traditionally-fashioned low ponytail that ends at the middle of his back. Pale blue eyes. Fair-to-moderate skin. Traditional clan tattoo on his forehead. He covers his tattoo and the top of his head with a bandanna (usually white). He often wears a mix of traditional Asian clothing and modern clothing. His left ear is pierced at the top. Above average height, broad shoulders, muscularly built. Wears bandages over his hands in an attempt to keep them unharmed.**

**Background: Born in Paro, Bhutan. Trained from the age of 3 to be a martial arts expert, specializing in Gentle Fist, a clan specialty. He excelled in any type of fighting, and was often thrown out of schools early in life because of this. He was incredibly intelligent, and was destined to take over the city's defense systems in place of his father after he graduated from a local college. His uncle, his father's twin brother, was secretly under watch by an underground drug market leader due to an old debt. His father was killed by mistake, and the murderers fled the country. He was sent away to England for his studies soon after, and attended Cambridge for four years while studying a multitude of different interests, including: languages and law. During his college years, he began hiring out his special services for anything from street fights to underground busts in an attempt to find his father's killers. He's been arrested 5 times due to different violent situations in 4 different countries, but has never been held for more than 48 hours each time. He continues to work as hired help throughout the western hemisphere.**

**Cause of Insanity: Murder of his father**

**Current Location: London, England**

**Family/Relations: Younger Cousin (Location unknown)-was taken by his father's murderers. Father (deceased)-killed in place of his uncle.**

**Personality: He is stiff, and relatively difficult to get along with, but will give someone respect when they've earned it from him. He doesn't hold grudges against anyone except his father's killer, and deems anyone unable to rival him in strength a weakling. He holds those who hire him out as useless unless they can give him the information he wants. He is nearly fearless, and would do anything for his cousin, Hinata, whom he loves greatly. He is very chivalrous and often considered chauvinistic.**

**Special Skills: Gentle Fist, martial arts, above average tactical skills**

* * *

1. Alright! So now we know why they're in Japan, and Shino randomly walking out of the plane without anyone knowing he was even on it? Stalkerish? Haha.

2. So, I hope you are all excited to find out what happens next, but unfortunately, there will be a few filler chapters before anything else happens. I know, I know! Curse you AMB11! Right?

3. If you can tell me who Orochimaru's competition are, the people that were showed in the slideshow, I'll put your name in the next chapter in the author's note!

4. So, Itachi? Right. Sasuke, this is going to be so screwed up. Have fun!

5. Let me know if you liked this chapter! Oh, and check out my SasuNaru fic. **You'll Surrender Eventually**. It's pretty popular, and I think it's pretty good. It's a male Sasuke and female Naruto pairing, so if you're cool with that and are enjoying any of my other works, I'd take a look at it!

6. This one is just meant to be a thanks, so... Thank you to my readers!

R & R, Love AMB11!


	5. Roomies With Criminals

I hope you enjoyed the last chapter! I'm trying to update one of my stories every day, so I'm skipping around all three for the time being. Expect an update every three days, but don't hurt me if it doesn't happen exactly on schedule. I write everything on a whim or when I get a random idea, so I can't guarantee it'll always come to me when I need to. I basically just think up a plot and write chapters that randomly hit me that pertain to the plot. I'm not much of a planner. Feh.

Sorry for the long wait! I have a whole bunch of summer assignments that I still need to finish, and one huge one I need to start... Curse you AP World History... Rawrgh... I start marching band next week, so updates might slow just a bit since I'll be busy during most of every day until school starts. I'm not even in it yet, and I already know that High School sucks.

I'm officially a beta-reader, so if you're ever looking, check me out.

**Disclaimer: **I don't own nothing. When you live in the the part of the south I do, this is actually an acceptable response. Sad, really.

* * *

Chapter 5: Roomies With Criminals

"This place is cooler than I'd been expecting, despite the gay welcoming committee. Creepy-Maru seems right up your alley though, Red Eyes." Naruto threw his bag onto the top bunk of one of the double beds in the room and swung himself up onto the rungs of the ladder. He inspected the mattress before pulling himself up onto the bed easily, nearly bumping his head on the ceiling.

"I don't roll that way, idiot." Sasuke rolled into the bunk under Naruto and sat down, setting his bag gently beside him and unfolding a few personal items from inside it. He pulled his phone out of his back pocket and set it on the stark white pillow sheet, looking up at the other men in the room when Kiba's cough broke the pregnant silence, and was immediately taken aback by all of the disbelieving looks. He spluttered out an indignant 'What? It's true.' before regaining his composure and huffing at his irritating new roommates.

"Heh, must be A-sexual." Naruto snickered to himself.

There was a moment of silence before the blonde shrugged the awkward moment off and swung his feet over the metal bars around his new bed. His rubber soles squeaked quietly every time he moved his feet against the ladder. He pulled his iPhone out of the pocket of his orange skinny jeans and messed around on the paint app while he waited for the rest of his new acquaintances to finish unpacking.

"Oh heck no, Pretty Boy. I call top bunk!" Kiba pulled Neji off of the ladder of the third bunk bed in the room and turned him to face him. The shorter brunette jabbed the much larger male in the chest and took a step into his personal space. Kiba stood on his tiptoes to fist the collar of Neji's form-fitting beige polo.

"I don't see any problem with it." Neji brushed Kiba off of him and turned back to the ladder, only to be pulled back around by the other brunette. Neji sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose in irritation. "Fine. Tell me why you want it, and maybe I'll consent."

Kiba rocked back on the balls of his feet and unzipped his jacket, petting the dog that had remained hidden up until then before turning his attention back to the pretty man. "Well, first off, I like to sleep in a place where I'd have an advantage as a sniper." Neji nodded in understanding at the explanation. "Second, Akamaru has to sleep with a window view or else he howls all night." He pointed at the wall where the wide windows ran along the upper end of the wall above a large window seat that was set above the ground on a concrete step. "And seeing as he's small, I don't think he'd be able to get up there easily." Neji eyed the panting puppy with disdain, planning to throw it out the window if it ever woke him up.

"I see. Is that all?" Neji reached his arm above his head, long fingers curling around the third rung from the top, his brown boot squeaking when he rested it on the bottom rung.

"Well, yeah." He jerked Neji off of the ladder when the taller man turned his back and scurried up the ladder as fast as he could, slipping through Neji's fingers when the long-haired man tried to pluck him off of the bed. "There is also no freakin' way I'm sleeping underneath someone that looks as gay as you."

"Nice one!" Naruto pumped his fist into the air, his eyes still locked on the screen of his phone. Sasuke grunted his agreement from his bunk, glad that the sexuality jokes had finally changed torture subjects.

Neji's face turned a bright shade of red in rage and he kicked the bed post behind him, jarring Shikamaru awake, who'd been napping through the situation. The tall genius sat up quickly, knocking his forehead into the metal bars above his head. He rubbed at the bruising spot and glared angrily at Neji, blaming him for any possible loss of IQ points from the blow. Neji threw his bag angrily onto the only single bed in the room and settled down onto it, crossing his legs in a meditative position.

"Why must we all share the same quarters?"Shino pushed his sunglasses up his nose and slid the hood back off of his bushy brown hair. He sat down on the bunk beneath Kiba, who hung his head over the edge to smile at the creepy young man.

"Who knows." Shikamaru rubbed the edge of his brow and leaned back on his bed, glad that they were long enough and that his feet wouldn't be hanging off the end while he slept. "Convenience probably. We're a bunch of criminals, so it was most likely easier to keep us under surveillance like this." The bunk above Shikamaru's head shifted as the red-head above him moved around.

Gaara looked across the room, Kiba in the bed a few feet from his and Naruto in the top bunk of the bed against the wall across from the one he was leaning up against. The young man exhaled loudly and crossed his arms across his chest, digging through his small bag for a few things. His keyboard was laying at the foot of his bed on top of the neatly folded comforter that matched the others on every other bed in the room. The room got suddenly quiet once everyone had settled into their new living quarters, some relaxing and others busying themselves with electronics or personal items. Naruto yawned loudly.

Gaara slung his small backpack over his shoulder and slid down the ladder of his bed, his heavy boots hitting the ground with a loud thunk. He clipped the over-the-shoulder bag across his mesh-clad chest and tied a chain necklace with two strange looking charms around his neck. He shuffled over to the small foyer of the apartment-like room, passing the small kitchenette and living area on his way to the door.

Naruto hopped down from his bunk, disregarding any other safer route, and hurried after the youngest member of their company, Kiba in tow shortly after.

'Where you going kid?' Gaara opened the heavy metal door, the hinges groaning loudly from its weight as it swung inward with ease.

'I saw a workout room on the way in. I'm going to find it.' The red-head messed with a few of the piercings in his ears after he shut the door behind him, leaving the older men back at the room. His black shorts swished around his knees, brushing the tops of his knee-high, lace-up leather boots. His mesh shirt was tucked into the waistband of the baggy shorts, held up by an adjustable cloth belt. His footsteps were loud in the wide hallway, his heavy boots dragging slightly on the thin carpet that ran like a table runner through the middle of the corridor.

His necklace swayed along his collar bone as he walked, occasionally brushing coldly against the skin of his toned chest. The plain-looking hearing aids hanging from the thick chain were heavy around his neck, but it was a comfortable weight he'd grown accustomed to. Gaara put his rough-skinned hands in the pockets of his black cargo shorts, waiting at the end of the hall when he noticed all of the other guys following him. His teal eyes locked on Shikamaru when the lazy teen glanced at him, and the red-head narrowed his eyes when the tall male said something out of the corner of his lips to the blond on his left. _I hate it when people talk about me like I don't_ _notice._

"You know, if he was taller, I'd be really intimidated." Shikamaru rubbed at one of his eyes with the knuckles of his hand before shoving both hands into the pockets of his jeans.

"I'm intimidated anyway." Naruto unbuttoned his shirt and slung it over his shoulder, running a hand through his blonde locks as he approached the impatiently waiting preteen. "12 years old, armed, and scary as Satin. Kinda looks like him too with that red hair. Reason enough to be cautious if you ask me."

Kiba crossed his arms behind his head, walking backwards in front of the group until they reached the end of the corridor, turning right at the fork and following Gaara to where he'd seen their destination. The brunette pulled the heavy door open, and Gaara led them into yet another room, this time in a hallway they all recognized as the one they'd come through when they passed a door with Orochimaru's name printed out neatly in both Kanji and Romanji.

Neji braided his hair over his shoulder and tied the end into a knot before throwing it back to rest against his bare back. His rough hands were covered in a layer of white tape and gauze up to his elbows, where scars peeked out of the ends of the light protection on his arms. Kiba spun around to face forward just as the group finally made it to a grey door on the right of the empty hallway, the sign just to the side of the door distinguishing it as the 'Training Room.'

"It's pass coded. How do we get in?" Kiba pressed a few random buttons on the padlock underneath the sign and stepped back when it buzzed almost angrily at him in rejection.

"I could hack it if you guys really want to get in. Wouldn't take long." Shikamaru messed with the black skinny tie hanging from the collar of his grey button-up, lazily glancing at the padlock. Neji pushed the skinny man out of the way with his shoulder, and brought his fist back behind him, sliding gracefully into a simple stance. His hair blew behind him as he swung out with precision and slammed his knuckles into the small machine.

A few of the keys from the lock fell to the ground, sparks flying from the crushed machinery until a light flashed green briefly on the screen before winking out. The latch inside the door clicked and the door swung inward. Neji stepped to the side and gestured for them to enter, pleased that his attempt had actually succeeded.

"I wonder how much of this guy's stuff we can break without getting charged." Shikamaru ran a hand along a few of the treadmills lined up against the walls before heading over to a few chairs in the corner of the room and plopping down into the most comfortable looking one.

"Why'd you come if you aren't going to do anything?" Kiba's voice echoed loudly across the room. Sasuke made his way over to the bench press in the middle of the room and sat on the seat, staring at the lazy genius who was currently kicking the drink machine when it ate his dollar.

"Exercise isn't really my thing. I just figured I'd come along to get a bit of a layout for the place, but once we got here, I realized that I really don't have the energy to walk around this entire factory. It's huge." Shikamaru grinned lazily when his Coke finally fell into the slot on the machine. He sat back in his chair and took a swig from the plastic bottle.

"Makes sense to me." Sasuke situated the rights weights on the bar and leaned back on the seat, Naruto spotting him. Kiba stepped onto one of the treadmills and took the small towel from around his neck and hung it on the handle. The small man pulled his black tank top off over his head and dropped it to the ground, slicking his shaggy bangs back and clipping them out of his face.

"I suppose I could do my kind of exercise if it'd make you feel better about me not doing anything." Shikamaru took another sip of his carbonated drink and pulled his phone out, looking through a few programs, occasionally muttering under his breath to himself. The clanging of metal was loud in the large, spacious room, natural light illuminating its' occupants from the entire wall made of windows that faced what seemed to be an inner courtyard.

A slightly crooked smirk flashed its' way across Shikamaru's face just as his eyes met Kiba's over the edge of his cell phone screen. The treadmill suddenly started, its' sole occupant flying off the end and barrel-rolling straight into the other man in the room that had simply tagged along like the lazy teen. Kiba and Shino crashed to the ground in front of the windows, the bigger of the two hurrying to his feet, searching for his sunglasses that had flown from his face in the commotion.

"You know, Shika. You've got a really good sense of humor for such a smart person. Usually, y'all are a bunch of stiffs." Naruto barked out during his short breaks from his laughter, Sasuke setting the equipment back properly and sitting up to join in with his blonde companion.

"I'm going to kill you one day Nara. I swear it." Kiba got to his feet and cracked his neck jerkily, his pointed teeth poking out between his lips. Shino slipped his sunglasses back up onto the bridge of his nose and walked over to where Shikamaru was leaning against the treadmill, which was still moving at top speeds. He punched the tall man in the side and stuck his bottom lip out in an almost imperceptible pout.

"You owe me one. He's heavy for a midget." Shino crossed his arms across his chest and went over to the drink dispenser, putting in a ten from the worn leather wallet he pulled out of the pocket of his trench coat. "Want something? Nara's buying." All of the men rushed over to the machine to put in their orders at the word of a free drink.

"Wai-What!" Shikamaru patted his pockets for his wallet, delving his long, pale fingers into the depth of the hidden inner pocket on the inside of his jacket. "How'd you-"

Shino waved the wallet above his head while he straightened up, Mountain Dew in hand while the rest of the group went back to their previous occupations. The lid opened with a quiet crack, a bit of the drink fizzing over the top and down the sides, mixing with the condensation. Shino tossed the now-empty wallet back to its' owner, who caught it clumsily. Shikamaru sat down in the chair beside Shino and kicked his feet up on the coffee table in front of him. The room was quiet except for the clanging of metal and the drag of the conveyor belt on the treadmill, the occasional beep coming from the screen ticking like a metronome.

Shikamaru made to put his wallet back in his pocket, but turned a suspicious eye on the brunette beside him, who hid a smirk with a sip of his soda. The young teen flipped the wallet open and checked each compartment, eventually letting out a sigh and holding his hand out to the chuckling man beside him. "Gimme my credit card back."

* * *

"Alright, I'm putting my bet on Pretty Boy. This is hand-to-hand, and that's his specialty." Kiba dropped a ten in the styrofoam cup when it passed him before handing it to the blonde beside him, who was practically vibrating in his seat. Naruto wiped at a bit of sweat that leaked through the cloth tied around his forehead and dripped into his eyes. The shaggy blonde locks slipped through his fingers, sweat glistening on his fingertips when he dropped his bet into the cup and passed it on to Sasuke.

"I'm goin' with the kid since no one else will." Naruto wiped the towel Kiba handed him across his sweat-soaked chest and dropped it to the ground with a word of thanks to the brunette. He approached the two that were preparing to fight, pushing them a step farther apart by a gentle shove to their shoulders.

Gaara looked up at his opponent, slipping the hearing aids from around his neck and off the chain. He fixed them into his ears, flicking them on, careful of the piercings lining the hook. He pulled his mesh shirt off over his head and handed it to the blonde, along with the chain his ear pieces had been hanging from. Neji retied the end of his braid and fixed the knot of his white bandanna under his hair.

"'No weapons. I want a fist fight only, and when we declare a winner both of you must stop immediately." Naruto signed as he spoke to the two fighters, the air around him buzzing from his excitement. "This is for training purposes, so don't fight until the other is unconscious. Just try to get one up on your opponent. Are we understood?" Neji nodded and bowed respectfully to Naruto while Gaara's oddly colored eyes rolled in a full circle until they met their starting point and locked gazes with the tall blonde man. Naruto sighed, but a smile flickered across his features almost tiredly. 'Assume the position.'

Gaara's eyes narrowed before he rolled them again, but the red-head locked his fingers behind his head and spread his legs to shoulder's width. Naruto stood behind the small preteen and started at the pockets at the red-head's sides, patting down each leg slowly. Naruto pulled a small dagger from one pocket, and another, larger knife, from the waist band of his shorts. Gaara sighed and hung his head, his chin against his wiry chest, arms still behind his head while the jaws of each older man dropped when weapon after weapon was taken from the young man's person. Naruto kicked the small pile to the side of the clearing in the courtyard, away from the two fighters, with a grimace. Gaara smirked slightly and lowered his hands from behind his head, cracking his neck and shoulder.

"I'm unarmed. I don't really use weapons." Neji locked gazes with the smirking teen, and rose to his full height, towering over his opponent. Naruto nodded to Neji.

"Do you think those things do anything since he can't hear?" Kiba turned to Shikamaru, covering his mouth with his hand in case Gaara could read his lips. The pair ignored the conversation going on between the three in the middle of the grassy clearing once Naruto started going over a list of rules.

"I don't know the extent of the damage to his hearing, so they could help him. Or maybe they're a good luck charm or something. I'm more curious about the nasty scars all over his back." Shikamaru finished just as Naruto sprinted over to where the group of men had rigged up a small seating area and skid to a stop in front of his seat.

"GO!" The blonde fell back into his seat with grandeur just as Neji and Gaara rushed each other.

Neji slid his weight to his hind leg in a crouch, his other leg spread out in front of him. Gaara's boot connected solidly with Neji's forearm, and the smaller male was launched in a flip over Neji's head, landing in a spin. The second the red-head's feet hit the ground, Neji spun, both feet swinging out with incredible strength, his weight on his hands on the ground beneath him. Gaara leaned out of the attack, climbing quickly to his feet while Neji's momentum brought him to his. They faced each other, the past minute replaying through each of their minds while they search for an opening.

_I can't let him hit me with his hands. A kick should be alright, but one pressure point from the Hyuga and I'm down. _Gaara narrowed his eyes and stepped back a bit. _My advantage is my size and speed. He's fast too, but his bulk makes his turn radius wider._ Gaara's eyebrow ticked slightly. _That's how I'll take him down. _

Neji sped toward him again, landing a solid kick to the red-head's chest before the smaller fighter could make a move. Gaara got to his feet, coughing a bit, trying catch his breath. He stretched his shoulder and brought his hand back behind him, running towards Neji, dropping to the ground with incredible speed when the brunette swung out at him with an aimed jab. He curled up and ducked under Neji's fist. Gaara skid on the grassy ground the last foot and crashed bodily into Neji's knees. The brunette dropped to the ground beside the red-head.

"Oh! Cheap shot man." Naruto cried out in protest when Sasuke tipped his chair back and the blonde crashed noisily to the ground.

"You're betting on him, stupid! Don't argue when he gets an advantage." Sasuke tackled Naruto when the blonde kicked out and clipped his jaw, the two tousling loudly, cursing at each other while the actual fight continued a few yards away.

Neji spun on the palms of his hands in an attempt to clear enough space around him to stand. Gaara kicked out blindly when Neji's shin caught him in the temple, and was rewarded by a grunt of pain when his boot connected solidly with Neji's wrist, a resounding crack filling the small space between them. The advanced fight quickly deescalated to a fist fight, neither quite keeping the other down long enough for it to be considered a win.

Neji gripped Gaara by the forearms and flipped him over his head, twisting his grip once he'd gotten to his knees. The brunette launched the small male into the air with a simple spin and climbed to his feet. Gaara curled into himself, his feet hitting the ground and his fingertips digging into the ground in front of him as he skid to a stop from the throw. He sort of felt like a human cannonball.

He rushed the older man. Neji braced himself for the impact, which wasn't as powerful as he'd been expecting. The lithe preteen locked hands with the muscular fighter, getting thrown up into the air above his head, their hands still locked together. Gaara dropped from his hand stand and brought his heavy boots down onto Neji's shoulders in a desperate move, a cruel smile overtaking his face.

Neji fell to his knees when both of his arms twisted painfully and he lost his balance. Gaara's hands dropped from Neji's and landed on the brunette's broad shoulders. Neji caught himself on one forearm, the other pressing to the sweaty chest of the young man that had his knee digging into his shoulder. Gaara raised his fist to be level with Neji's face, and took a deep breath.

"So the kid won, huh?" Kiba kicked back in his chair and cursed to himself at the loss of ten bucks. Sasuke smirked, his falsely red eyes narrowing in amusement.

"Take a closer look." The dark haired male pointed at the two fighters entangled with each other. Shikamaru leaned forward, resting his elbows on his knees. Neji pressed his fingers to the pressure point he'd managed to reach and Gaara put a bit more weight on Neji's windpipe, before they both backed off simultaneously.

"Well, I'll be. It's a tie." Gaara and Neji got off of one another, the small preteen's chest panting heavily from exertion while Neji merely took a few deep breaths to get his racing heart under control, more used to such extreme battle conditions. A smirk made it's way to Neji's face, and it made his crystalline eyes glow with respect. He held his hand out to the gasping boy and shook the much smaller one offered to him, pleased by the surprisingly strong grip.

The two walked back over to the others and sat down under the shade. Neji took the cup from Kiba's hand, frowning slightly at the content, before confiscating the money and counting it calmly.

"Well?" Naruto leaned forward eagerly, an excited grin eating up any other expression that may have wanted to show on his face.

"He's agile, and fast, but his attacks don't really hold much power because of his size. That's probably why he uses weapons." Neji glanced at the small red-head, who was twirling a pocket knife he'd retrieved from his confiscated pile between his fingers. There was a mad look in his green-blue eyes, and the hint of teeth peeking out between his upturned lips made Neji recoil in a grimace. "That or he's just screwed up." Shikamaru wrote down a few notes from the battle in his notebook, turning the camera on his phone off after saving the video of the fight.

"You're a professional fighter, right Hyuga?" The brunette nodded his head when Sasuke spoke.

"In a sense."

"You're better than I was expecting."

"I'll take that as a compliment, Uchiha." White-blue clashed with blood red heatedly.

Naruto rubbed his neck, the warmth of the sun against his skin beginning to irritate him. "We'll have to continue this another time, I think it's time we cleaned up and headed back to the room." The blonde checked his watch. "We're eating at 4:30 and it's just after 3."

* * *

"Did you steal that from the band set in the dining hall?"

"Maybe." Kiba climbed up to his bed, acoustic guitar strapped to his back.

"Why?" Naruto watched the brunette with an interested gleam in his eyes. "You play?"

"Not for a few years, but I did play a while back. My sister taught me." Kiba strummed a few chords, tuning it carefully. Gaara pulled his keyboard into his lap, flicking a few switches and playing a few scales to warm his fingers up.

"You have a sister?" Shikamaru peeked up at Kiba, his hair down from its' usual ponytail and hanging around his face and shoulders.

"Had. Once upon a time, ya know." Gaara picked up a gentle tune to a song that Kiba knew, the tattooed brunette picking a few places to start in, keeping in pace perfectly with the red-head. It was a simple tune, but Naruto immediately recognized it, humming along quietly until he remembered a few of the words after the intro.

_Mama told me when I was young _

_Come sit beside me, my only son _

_And listen closely to what I say. _

_And if you do this  
_

_It'll help you some sunny day. Oh Yeah!  
_

_Oh, take your time... Don't live too fast,  
_

_Troubles will come and they will pass.  
_

_You'll find a woman, yeah yeah, you'll find love,  
_

_And don't forget son,  
_

_There is someone up above. _

Kiba grinned toothily at the blonde, and picked up his strumming when Gaara sped up a bit at a certain part, carefully counting in his head. "Keep going!" The blonde's well pitched higher voice carried out when he sang a bit louder, the rest of the room looking up at the musical trio singing from the top bunks.

_And be a simple, kind of man. _

_Oh be something, you love and understand. _

_Baby be a simple, kind of man. _

_Oh, won't you do this for me son, _

_If you can? _

_Forget your lust, for the rich man's gold _

_All that you need, is in your soul, _

_And you can do this, oh baby, if you try. _

_All that I want for you my son, _

_Is to be satisfied. _

Sasuke's voice joined Naruto's when he repeated the chorus, the lower and more gravelly tones blending well with Naruto's higher tones.

_Boy, don't you worry... you'll find yourself. _

_Follow your heart, lord, and nothing else. _

_And you can do this, oh baby, if you try. _

_All that I want for you my son, _

_Is to be satisfied. _

_Baby be a simple, be a simple man. _

_Oh be something, you love and understand. _

_Baby be a simple, kind of man._

The trio turned quartet faded out. Kiba grinned wildly at his partners and set his guitar down on his mattress. "Didn't take you for a country man, Uchiha."

"I'm not, but my brother was. That was one of his favorite songs when we were younger." Sasuke sighed and fell back on his bed, his head hitting the pillow. Kiba shook his head, but jumped down from his bed and propped the stolen guitar out of sight in case someone came looking for it. He carried Akamaru back up into his bed and snuggled down under the covers with the young dog.

"If being wanted fugitives ever fails for you guys, you can start a band." Naruto climbed under his covers and crossed his arms behind his head, chuckling quietly at Shikamaru's monotone comment.

Moonlight shone through the windows that lined the wall, and crickets chirped loudly from outside. The air smelled of their midnight snack of ramen that Neji had fixed in the kitchenette, and it warmed his skin like a blanket in the calm atmosphere. It felt like a sleepover, except he didn't really know these people beyond the fact that they were all probably insane in some way, yet were still sane enough to get employment from Orochimaru, despite being criminals. They were like him. He was living with criminals, but he wasn't frightened. Naruto grinned; it was actually thrilling to meet other people as insane as he felt he was.

He thought back on the spar from earlier, and how excited a part of him felt when he watched other people fighting, wishing he could've taken part in the battle. Or that the fight could've been a bit bloodier. He was sick. The blonde dragged a hand down his face and turned onto his side with a sigh. They're intimidating, they argue, they break everything, they fight, they're always armed, they're hackers, thieves, rude, and most of all, criminally insane, but they're his roommates and partners. They were basically chosen because of the saying, "Just crazy enough to work."

The room became peacefully quiet until they heard a loud shout from the hallway, each young man sitting up in bed aside from Gaara and Shikamaru, the former of which was asleep and the latter who was wary of sitting up while inside of his bed again; he rubbed his forehead in memory of the pain.

"Who stole my freakin' guitar?!" Kiba and Naruto nearly fell off of their bunks laughing, the rest of the room relaxing back into their beds.

"He's not getting that back." Kiba growled at the door, gun pointed at the spot where he could hear the stubby musician that had been playing at dinner banging on the heavy door.

"Wanna hang him by his underwear over the steps out front of the factory?" Naruto grinned, and Kiba's smile slowly grew to match the blonde's.

He was roomies with criminals and the criminally insane, but to be honest, was he any different?

. . . . . . .

End Chapter 5. Character time :)

* * *

Nara, Shikamaru:

**Age: 16**

**Height/Weight: 6'4"/200 Ibs**

**Origin: USA/ Arkansas**

**Appearance: Black hair that is always pulled into a ponytail on top of his head. Brown eyes. Lightly tanned skin. He has both ears pierced once. He is constantly slouched over, giving the appearance that his height is not as great as it is. Very tall, lean, lanky and on the thin side for his size. He has his last name tattooed on his upper right shoulder over a picture of a deer. He is usually dressed extremely casually and always appears tired.**

**Background: Born in Batesville, Arkansas. Graduated high school at the age of 12. He began tinkering with electronics from then on as an escape from doing things he felt were too "troublesome." By age 14, he'd been given 3 warnings from the state about his small illegal escapades where he would test his knowledge of the techinical world through hacking, including causing an almost nationwide blackout from a laptop in the school library (never proven in court). During his 6th year of studies while at Harvard Law, he hacked into a high security bank in Switzerland, withdrew $3 million U.S. dollars, and deposited them into the President's bank account in Mexico from his cell phone as the ultimate test to his abilities, which nearly caused a war in the long run. He was never arrested due to lack of evidence against him. He continues to invent small gadgets for himself, and even a few that have become mainstreamed. He was arrested when he turned 15 for shoplifting some parts from a Radioshack, which he later recounted as "The most ridiculous thing I could've possibly been busted for," and was released after 6 months.**

**Cause of Insanity: His own ingenious; IQ over 200.**

**Current Location: Somewhere in Utah**

**Family/Relations: (All deceased)**

**Personality: Extremely lazy and laid-back, but reliable in a pinch. He's relatively easy to get along with so long as you let him sleep, even if he will call generally everyone and everything annoying. When necessary, he can be extremely focused. He is always being called smart-alecky by everyone.**

**Special Skills: Brilliant tactician and inventor, terrible fighter**

* * *

1. Okay, so first off, I do not own the song or lyrics I used in here! It's called Simple Man by Lynyrd Skynyrd. Whew, got that off my chest.

2. I'm sorry about the long break between updates, but I'm a busy young person! I'll try to do better from now on.

3. I had fun writing this chapter. It's all about Naruto coming to terms with the fact that he'll be stuck with these people for a while, and that they are dangerous people, like he is. There's not much of a point, but it's a bit more than a filler because it actually is a building chapter. My fight scene sucked though. -_-

R & R peoples! Love, AMB11!


	6. Negotiated and Infiltrated

It's been a while, but I sort of struggled with this chapter. It was difficult, but here it is y'all! Enjoy, Love AMB11!

**Warning: **This story is rated T mainly for the implications of this chapter. There is absolutely nothing written that is explicit or descriptive, but there is the implication that a man has done things with the female prisoners that wasn't of their will, even though it is NOT actually written out. Be aware of this if you feel it is too bad for it to be in a T rated story. If I have a lot of people complain, I will up the rating, but I felt it was okay seeing as how I kept it very discreet. **YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED! NO FLAGGING ME!**

**Disclaimer: **I hereby grudgingly admit to the fact that I sort of do not entirely own not any part of the anime known as Naruto by all of the other people that don't not own anything about it... I give up... That confused even me. I don't own anything. Better!

Hidan's last name is actually the name of his village seeing as he doesn't actually have one. Sorry folks!

Note: If you're confused about why Neji is the only one of the guys that uses honorifics when referring to another person, it's because he's the only one from Asia (aside from Orochimaru, who doesn't talk as much as the more likeable people.) Hope this clears everything up! If you're still a bit confused, go back and read the character descriptions in bold at the end of each chapter.

"&Uuuuuuuuuuuiiiiuuuuuuuuu1qqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqq qqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqqq`1"... A brilliant message from my little kitten Leonard Sheldon who desperately wanted to add his opinion to the story. We thank him for his contribution to the world of literature. (I'm impressed that he got a capital letter in there...)

* * *

Chapter 6: Negotiated and Infiltrated

"Please. Don't let him take her again, she's only a child."

"I'm sorry Miss Hyuga, but I don't have a choice. He's requested I bring her." Itachi loosened his grip on Sakura's forearm when tears leaked from the chained girl's eyes. He knelt down beside her, the heavy metal around her legs jingling as he sat her down gently. "If I could, I'd let you all out of here," He whispered assuredly in the sobbing pink-haired girl's ear calmly.

"P-please Itachi-san. Please don't make her go. I'll-I'll go in her place!" Hinata kicked at the bars of her cell until she couldn't feel her left leg from the knee down. Tears rolled down her pale skin and dripped from her chin to the filthy water that trickled around her ankles and joined into the strong current outside of the cell. "Take me! Just, please, let Sakura stay. She's gone so many times, I just-I..." Her voice lost it's disparity when Itachi gathered Sakura into his arms and waded through the grungy water back to her cell. He placed her gently on the cot inside and shuffled quickly back outside, locking the door behind him.

"Will you accept the consequences of defying the boss's direct order?" Hinata nodded, her cracked lower lip bleeding between her teeth. "You do realize you probably won't be coming back," He said quietly as he unlocked the door in front of her and attached the necklace-like chain around the pale column of her neck.

"I-I know. I don't care." Itachi took her by the hand and helped her walk out of the dark and dank room, the protests of the other prisoners fading to a distant clamor as the tall man led her slowly down the fire-lit corridor. Her feet made a small pattering sound with every tentative step she took, limping slightly from the pain in her left shin.

"You know, I never took you to be the brave one. Good luck, Mistress Hyuga," He said with the tiniest smile as he pushed the large door at the end of the hall open, letting Hinata walk in by his side instead of dragging her behind him like he was supposed to. Hinata felt tears prickle behind her eyes, but she wasn't sure if it was from Itachi's blatant respect for her or because she'd just stepped into the first room with electric lighting that she'd been in for several months.

"Uchiha, what is this? I specifically asked for the young one." The man before her smiled, and Hinata fought back a grimace at the unpleasant sight of his slightly crooked teeth and his too-thin lips being spread in the ugliest expression she'd ever seen.

"Sir," Itachi knelt down, Hinata being pulled down beside him by the chain secured around her neck that was in his hand, "She is extremely ill, and I didn't want for you to have any problems while you were enjoying yourself." Pale eyes noticed the veins straining in the raven's neck as he grit his teeth, literally fighting with himself to not spit out the last words. "This one volunteered herself."

"I see, thank you for your consideration. I suppose she'll do for now, you may be excused." Itachi dropped the chain in his hand and stood, bowing deeply at the waist, and then backing out of the room. Hinata waited until the door had clicked shut behind her to raise her face from the hard stone floor she'd been thrown on. She rested herself on her knees, her head bowed, and waited with bated breath as the footsteps of the grotesque man approached her slowly.

"Sir." She lowered her head further and rested her hands flat on the cold ground before her.

"You know, I'm very upset that the young one is unavailable at the moment. This will be the last time I get to play with you now, seeing as how I've promised my favorite woman to my business partner as part of a negotiation. I was going to send the pink girl since she's not quite the beauty the rest of you are." Strong fingers gripped her chin and tore her gaze from the floor, forcing her to look into his narrow eyes. "It's a shame, really."

"How can I be of service tonight Master?" Hinata fought the grit from her voice.

"You can do everything I say, or be responsible for the death of every one of your friends, including the young one you sacrificed yourself for." He sat down on the ground in front of her, and forced her to sit next to him. "I have a little job for you, darling." His clammy hands rested at the dip of her back over the thin cotton of her shirt. A shiver ran up her spine at his disgusting touch, and his hideous smile returned to his lips.

"I-I'll do anything for you M-Master." She felt tears prickle in her eyes at the burn of the bile rising in her throat.

"When they find you," His breath was hot in the air next to her as he spoke, "You don't know anything, you don't know me, and you don't remember what happened. Understand?"

"W-what do you mean I-"

"No questions!" He yelled so loudly that it left her ears ringing. He dug his nails into her waist and grinned wickedly when she whimpered in pain. "Just do as I say, and you'll understand soon enough, _Princess _Hyuga." She bit her lip until it started bleeding again, her shoulders shaking as she cried silently. "Good. I knew you were at least somewhat intelligent." She hit the hard ground, her right arm cracking loudly as the strong man threw her to the stone floor. "Uchiha!"

"Yes sir." Itachi's muffled voice came from the other side of the door.

"Take her to the loading docks and get her to the meeting point as soon as possible. Hidan's going to want some time alone with her before they get there."

Itachi opened the door and immediately locked eyes with the silently sobbing girl that was curled up into a ball on the floor, and he felt his shoulders sag just a bit as he said, "Yes sir."

* * *

"This is crazy!" Another gust of wind blew Naruto across the glass wall of the building like a spider on its' silk thread, his equipment belt scraping against the windows as he skid several feet to his right, his hands and feet the only things holding him up. He looked down, his shaggy blonde hair doing its' best to keep him from seeing exactly how far up he was from the ground below. "What I wouldn't give to be Spider-Man right now." Naruto pressed a button on the front of his chest with his forearm and slammed his hand back onto the glass in a split second. A jolt of electricity rolled down his arms to the adhesive sensors in his gloves, upping the strength just as he slid across the frigid glass of the window in front of him the last few feet to where he needed to be. He pressed his body as close to the building as possible when another gust, stronger than the ones before, threatened to topple him from the 147th floor of the Aka Inc. headquarters despite his high-tech gear.

He tore one glove from his hand with his teeth, the chill of the high altitude and the low hanging clouds making his fingers numb almost instantly when they'd been bared. Naruto pressed the intercom button on his earpiece with shaking fingers and shouted so his voice could be heard over the angry sound of the wind gushing through the speakers. "I'm in place, I think." His blue eyes raked along the row of windows he was clinging to desperately by the tech in his boots and glove, the other pressed between his chest and the smooth surface in front of him, as he counted from the left to right, pleased when he was in the spot he'd been directed to go to. The goggles pressed against his cheeks, and he knew he'd have a ridiculous windburn in the morning.

"You idiot, you forgot your GPS down here. Did you seriously count each floor as you passed it?" Shikamaru's voice crackled over the line, surprisingly clear despite the distance between the receivers.

"Heheh, yeah. I even lost count a few times. I prefer low-tech Shika. Sorry to disappoint you," Naruto said just as he was slammed against the building by another sudden burst of wind. His teeth clenched until he was sure they were going to crack, his fingers cramping from holding himself in place when he began to slip. "Tell Sasuke to hurry it up before I feel even more like a bug on a windshield! It's as windy as Hell is hot up here and I'd rather not fall a thousand feet to my death before I've finished my bucket list."

"I can hear you, you idiot. I'm doing my best, but there's a guard just outside of the room you're hovering around."

"Just shoot their sorry butts so you can get me in there! I can't believe I let you talk me into trading jobs with you Uchiha."

"Shut it Naruto before I let you hang out there for the rest of the mission." Sasuke disconnected the connection between Naruto and his earpiece and brought the scope of his weapon to his red eyes, the automatic targeting linking with the pulse point of the man in front of the door he needed access to.

"Lower the power on your weapon to .34 percent of total power and it'll be just enough to stun him for 23 seconds without leaving enough of an impact for him to remember afterwards. You'll only have that long to get in." Sasuke glanced up at the camera that was mounted on the wall of the corridor and shook his head stiffly after Shikamaru had relayed the information via the speaker in his ear; the camera twitched in response.

"I've got a better idea. I just need to wait for the guard change," Sasuke whispered, his voice coming across as even huskier than usual because of the poor connection.

"Fine. You know what to do after you've entered, and make the knucklehead keep it quiet. I'm going to check in on Kiba and Shino. It's so troublesome not being able to talk to you all at once, but we got all this tech from Orochimaru and only one transmitter. What an idiot." The connection clicked off quietly in Sasuke's ear, and the black-haired man finally turned Naruto's line back on, flinching when the noisy blonde's voice went straight into an irritating rant. Sasuke felt a headache coming on.

The gun shifted gears silently as the red-eyed man turned the dial on the weapon, pointing the barrel at the man at the end of the corridor for when the next guard came in, his eyes trained on his watch. The second hand clicked half way around the face, and the bulky guard finally left his position, and Sasuke heard the elevator down the hall ding as the next watch came in. He only had one shot. He stepped around the corner he'd been hiding behind and walked out into the center of the corridor, the toes of his hunting boots clacking loudly on the white tile floor.

"Wai-Who the heck are you? You don't have clearance to-"

"Freeze! You are under my control for the next two minutes, and at the end of this time period you will fall unconscious and remember nothing of our encounter when you awaken exactly one minute later." Red eyes locked with chocolate brown irises, and Sasuke slowly clapped his hands together, watching as the guard's eyes hazed over. "It's nice to see you again, my friend. Now, why don't you let me into the room right there like you said you would," He said slowly, his voice deep and comforting.

"Of... course. I suppose I just forgot you'd be coming... tonight. Let's... going..." The blonde man gripped the key ring at his hip with limp fingers and staggered down the hall, Sasuke following along after him, his gun trained on the elevators the guard had just come from. "Here... you go..." Sasuke glanced over his shoulder when he heard keys jingling, and the lock clicking open behind him. Sasuke flicked the button that was taped to his throat, the wires running up to his ear crackling quietly.

"You've got the camera's all throughout this floor, right Shikamaru?"

"Duh." Sasuke narrowed his eyes at the lens above his head, frowning when it zoomed in then out; he just knew Shikamaru was mocking him.

"Just do your job Nara, because if you screw up we'll all die. This was your plan anyway."

"QUIT TRYING TO BE COOL AND GET IN HERE ALREADY UCHIHA!" The microphone squealed when Naruto's voice came through the speakers, and Sasuke was forced to rip the communicator from his ear or go deaf from the magnitude of the noise. He saw the hypnotized man in front of him flinch, awareness flashing in his eyes briefly before he fell to the ground in a limp pile of flesh and bones, dead to the world.

"Would you shut it, you screw up? You just nearly got me killed."

"I've been freezing my-" Sasuke turned the dial on his microphone, effectively shutting the blonde up, and wrapped his fingers around the arm of the unconscious man.

"Thanks to the idiot, I'll have to do it the hard way," Sasuke grumbled to himself while he hefted the larger man up from the ground and onto his limp legs, his own muscles straining under the weight of the guard. Sasuke checked his watch; one minute until the next guard change.

Sasuke pulled the man's eyelids open with his thumb and forefinger and held his eye level with the scanner beside the door, waiting until it beeped and he heard the loud thunk from inside the metal door. The elevator door down the hall dinged as it rose to the 147th floor, and Sasuke swore to himself. He leaned the guard against the wall as he began to gain consciousness and hurried inside the room, shutting the door behind him as fast as he could without slamming it, the lock clicking into place with a dull click.

The raven turned when he heard a muted banging behind him, and felt his jaw drop when he saw Naruto practically frozen to the window. _'Maybe I should've moved a bit faster. Oh well, in the past now.' _Sasuke hurried across the room, keeping his head low even though he knew no one could see him. He raised his gun to the window the blue-faced Naruto was leeched to and lowered the setting on his gun, firing in a steady line until he'd made an opening the blonde could easily fit through.

"Thank... God..." Naruto stumbled into the room clumsily and fell to the floor in an ungraceful heap. "I have a whole new respect for window washers."

"Shut up, idiot." Sasuke helped the semi-frozen young man to his feet. "Did you place them on your way up?" Naruto saluted sloppily.

"As instructed." Sasuke nodded and grunted in agreement before leaning Naruto against the wall, suddenly reminded of the blonde guard outside. He looked up, innocently shining blue eyes meeting gory, raging red, and every thought of the guard was gone; this man was far more dangerous than any guard.

"Good. Let's get a move on. We need to be on the other side of the building in less than ten minutes when Kiba starts firing and we're already running behind at least a minute."

Naruto cracked his shoulders, then his knuckles, and wrenched the vent covering from the wall above his head, the chair he was on tumbling to the ground with him when he lost his balance. Sasuke grimaced at the blonde and sent off a silent apology to Shikamaru that the spiky-haired genius would never hear. _'Sorry Nara, the idiot just isn't as trainable as we'd hoped.' _

. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Kiba loved guns, all kinds of guns, it didn't much matter what kind. As long as it shot a bullet and he'd been the one to pull the trigger, it filled him with such a warmth that had been unparalleled by anything in his life. He just wished that the warmth would hurry up already because he was freezing his tail off.

The wind picked up just a bit, and the petite brunette adjusted the large rifle, taking another peek through the scope up at his target building. Naruto had finally gotten pulled inside exactly three minutes ago; seven minutes left until he'd shoot. It would be beautiful, and he could already feel his fingers twitching in excitement, sweat beading across his bare back despite the fact that he was lying on a frigid rooftop in 70 mile an hour wind with gusts up to a hundred. A shiver racked furiously through his body, yet his trigger finger didn't move a millimeter. He felt so alive.

He really lived for moments like this. He was born to be a sniper, and he just knew, somewhere deep in his mind, he was meant to be a sniper on these kinds of jobs. He'd never been much for the goodie-two-shoes kind of gunman-ship, the closest he'd gotten being playing the protagonist in a 1st person shooter game once when in prison back a few years ago; shooting was much more exciting this way.

Kiba pressed the scope tightly against the top of his cheek bone again, locating the position of his first target for the umpteenth time in the past minute; he could probably fire blind and hit it by now. The rifle was a comfortable weight on his shoulder and the rough gravel of the rooftop sent a jolt through him every time he moved; every nerve in his body was on end. He just hoped Shino was in place or things would become a bit messy.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Shino balled his fingers together tightly in the deep pocket of his jacket. His palms were slick with sweat and he felt his left eye twitch in the beginnings of a nervous tick. His coat rustled as he sat down on the uncomfortable lobby bench, the people around him passing him by without a second glance; it helped that he looked like a blind man. Akamaru tugged on the leash yet again and whined quietly to the person that had taken him from Kiba an hour earlier. Shino crossed his legs and rested his cane on his lap, eyes sweeping around the room as he looked for his target from behind his dark sunglasses.

The clock on the table next to him ticked quietly; five minutes to go. He uncrossed his arms and tapped his fingers in a strange rhythm on his knees, counting in his head the seconds as they passed. It was a much more complicated plan than the ones he'd gone by before, but it was a much bigger operation, so to him, it made perfect sense. The only flaw he could see was that if even one person fell behind in their duties, they'd most likely be demolished along with the building.

_~Flashback~_

_"I like this plan," Kiba said with a manic grin while he ran a hand across the sleek sniper rifle he'd uncovered in the back of the black van Shikamaru had driven up in. They were in an enormous parking garage down the street from the biggest shopping market in town, all of the vehicles Orochimaru had provided for each of them, aside from Gaara, parked on the second floor near the elevators. _

_"Would you shut up? You don't even know what it is yet, Gun Junkie." Neji pulled on the small knot of tape on his wrist to tighten the gauze that was wrapped around his left hand, his pale eyes narrowed at his companion in irritation. "Please continue Nara-san."_

_"Alright, I read over the building's blueprints that Orochimaru faxed to our room last night and I think I've come up with a way to test all of your skills on this mission. On another note, I feel like this is mainly just a test to see how we work together, so don't try to show up anyone else. Just do your jobs and get out." Shikamaru brushed some of the hair that was down from his half-ponytail out of his eyes as he pulled a small tablet from inside his army green backpack. "Each of your instructions are simple and easy to understand, the hard part will be timing everything perfectly. We'll start as soon as Naruto scales the west wall of the building up to the-"_

_"Woah, wait. I have to do what now? I'm afraid of heights man!"_

_"Get over it, you're the only one of us that's got the proper endurance and strength to be able to physically climb that high and still keep going for a while afterwards. You don't have a choice, so shut up." Naruto sat back down on the hood of his car, his arms crossed and his eyes clenched shut tightly. "No more interruptions or we'll miss our chance. We don't have much time. As soon as I explain your parts, prepare and be ready to go." At the consecutive nods, he continued, "Alright. First, Naruto will scale the west wall of Aka Inc. once I've taken out all of the exterior cameras. He'll place my special bombs along specific spots that are weak points of the building itself. Uchiha, while he's climbing the outside, I need you on the inside to get him into the building once he's gotten to the prepared coordinates. Take out the guards and then make your way through the ventilation system to the other side of the building to meet up with Hyuga and the kid at the president's office. Inuzuka, you will be planted on the roof of the building across the street with-"_

_"My baby!" Kiba hugged the large gun to him, running his hand over the handle lovingly._

_"Right... On my signal, you will fire at the explosives on the side of the building to detonate them, and then disassemble the weapon. Load it up in your pack and then get back here as fast as your can."_

_"Yessir! Wait, what about Akamaru?"_

_"He's with Shino, who will be posing as a blind man with his seeing-eye dog in the lobby of the building. It's up to you to get the president back up to his office once he's in the lobby."_

_"What do you suggest I do?" Shino asked as he unbuttoned his trench coat, checking the small assortment of supplies tucked into the inside pockets._

_"Steal something, seeing as how-"_

_"Is that my watch? Give me that!" Shikamaru waited while Sasuke got his watch back from the smirking man before picking up where he left off._

_"As I was saying, steal something from him that he'll need to go back to get. Anything will work really; wallet, phone, keys. Now, when the president goes back up to his office, Hyuga and Gaara will ambush him and wait until Naruto and Sasuke get there. Feel free to try and torture any information out of him about why he's trying to get rid of Orochimaru's business, but don't leave any obvious marks on him."_

_"I understand, but someone may want to wake the kid up, he just missed all of that." Naruto kicked out at Gaara, who was sleeping on the hood of the orange car next to the blonde, and hit him in the leg, jumping back instantly when the small red-head woke with a start, knife in hand.  
_

_Shikamaru ran a hand over his face, rubbing his eyes tiredly. "So troublesome." He sighed exasperatedly, and got his phone out, messing around with something on the screen. The silence in the parking lot was awkward and heavy until everyone's cell phone buzzed loudly and the tallest man in the group slumped down on the wall behind him to the ground. "I can't get through to all of you, so you each have your instructions. Read them, memorize them, and then delete them when you're done."_

_"Works for me," Naruto said as he scrolled down the glowing screen of his phone. _

_"How'd you get our numbers?" Neji tucked his flip phone back into his pocket once he'd read through the remainder of his instructions. _

_"Just hacked into them. I work fast."_

_"Why does a 12 year old have an iPhone?" Naruto leaned over Gaara's shoulder, his eyes going crossed at all of the foreign squiggles on the screen. "And is that even a language?"_

_"Who cares? Now everyone get going and leave me in peace so I can hack into the security already. Go get into place."_

_"Let's do this!" Kiba said as he hurriedly packed up his weapon and ran for the exit. _

_~End Flashback~_

"Where is he? His shift ended five minutes ago." The bushy-haired young man checked the clock again, his fingers twitching from stress; four minutes to go.

"Have a nice evening Mr. Yugakure." Shino's ears perked up at the annoying voice of the secretary, and he stood hurriedly, walking across the fancy lobby, occasionally tapping his cane on the ground in front of him. He only had one chance.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Naruto hissed between his teeth and paused to tie his headband around his forehead to keep sweat from dripping into his eyes. "This is ridiculous. First I freeze my butt off outside, and now I have to crawl through a vent with the heat on. I swear, I'll never complain about snow or sunburn ever again."

"Would you shut up and get a move on already, you idiot! We're almost there." A push from behind the blonde had him scurrying down the final length of the elevator shaft, his hands sliding a bit from the perspiration that covered his entire being. Sasuke's heavy breathing picked up a bit behind him, and Naruto went just a little faster; the idiot must've been claustrophobic.

The blonde stopped once they'd reached the hall they were supposed to go to, struggled to get his feet in front of him, then kicked out with every ounce of strength in his legs. The grate buckled under the force of the kick and flew across the hall, hitting someone that had been walking the other side of the narrow passageway.

"Idiot, that's the president!" Naruto tumbled to the ground in a sweaty heap when Sasuke abruptly pushed him from behind, the smaller raven hurrying out after the large blonde. Neji rushed around the corner that was just a few steps down the hall, his pale eyes widening at the unconscious man that was beside Sasuke's feet. Gaara ambled out a few moments later, doing something on his cell phone.

"Well, I guess this makes our job a little easier. Naruto, you scout around a bit and see if you can find anything in the surrounding offices about his involvement with weapons dealerships. Take anything suspicious that you can find." Neji slung the silver-haired man over his shoulder with a bit of difficulty and carried him into the office behind him.

"Take the kid with you. He's more likely to cover your tracks than you are," Sasuke said as he brushed some of the dust off of his black jacket.

'I need to go to the bathroom.'

"What'd he say?" Sasuke leaned against the door frame behind him, waiting for Neji to come back.

"I dunno." 'Can you say that again?' Naruto signed to the small boy, only to feel doubly confused when he still didn't understand after Gaara had gone through it a second time. "No clue..."

"What do you mean you don't know? I thought you understood sign language."

Neji stepped out of the office, but kept his eyes trained inside. "There are different dialects, it might be slang or just a different version." Gaara shook his head and closed his black-lined eyes in exasperation. He signed the short sentence again, and again none of the adults around him showed any sign of understanding; this was becoming tiresome.

"I guess a game of Simon Says is a good way to pass the time until Shikamaru gives us the signal. Alright kid, spell it out for us."

Gaara pointed to the restroom down the hall, his face buried in the palm of his other hand.

"Seriously?" Sasuke blinked dumbly.

"At a time like this?" Neji asked while playing the the tip of his ponytail.

"When you gotta go, you gotta go." Gaara ran off down the hall once the blonde had nudged him that direction, his heavy boots thudding loudly with each step.

"So, there are different dialects?" Sasuke wiped a bit of sweat from his forehead after he checked on the man that was tied up in the room behind him. "I didn't know that. It's kind of like another language."

"Yeah. I use ASL and he uses some different form, a lot of cultural slang usually, so there are just some things he says that I don't underst-" Naruto covered his ears at the blood curdling scream that echoed all around him, his knees suddenly feeling weak. He ran off down the hallway towards the sound, Sasuke stepping into the room when their prisoner woke up, Neji standing guard at the door behind him.

The bathroom was a bit too bright compared to the darkness of the empty hallway, and Naruto felt his eyes tear up a bit at the change. "Gaara?" The blonde stepped around the wall that was in front of the door and glanced around to the stalls, grimacing at the amount of pink and lack of urinals in the bathroom. "Did you scream because you realized this was the girls room, because if you endangered all of us for something so stupid, I'll kill you." His voice faded off when he spotted the small red-head crammed underneath the sinks, rocking back and forth, his head cradled in his shaking hands. "Kid, are you okay?"

Naruto knelt down beside the shaking boy and placed his hand on the thick layers of clothing on the red-head's shoulder warily. "**الحصول على الخروج من لي!**" Gaara shrieked in a language Naruto didn't understand, his words clumsy and strange sounding, his voice deeper and scratchier than the blonde had expected it to be. The large man fell backwards in surprise and landed hard against the tile floor. "**شقيقة. ****شقيقة. ****شقيقة..." ** Naruto swallowed the lump in his throat as the child in front of him broke down, mumbling the same thing over and over again.

"What happened in here? I'm going to kill that kid, he woke the president up before Shikamaru sent us the signal."

"Neji, take the kid and get back to the room, I need to make a call." The brunette blinked slowly before forcibly grabbing the screaming red-head and carrying him from the room.

Naruto looked over his shoulder at the stall door that was cracked open in front of him as he connected his earpiece to Shikamaru's mic.

"What."

"Send Kiba the signal. Now."

"What, why?" Naruto stepped closer to the stall door and felt his heart skip a beat when he heard faint breathing on the other side.

"Something's come up, so just do it now. Shino should be in place already." He pushed the light weight metal door open with the tips of his fingers just as Shikamaru cut the line with an angry sounding grunt.

The stench of blood hit his nostrils once he'd finally gotten the door open as far as it would go, and when azure eyes met the most beautiful white-blue gaze he'd ever seen, he felt bile rise to his throat at the condition of the injured woman they were attached to.

"H-help..."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

End of Chapter 6. Time for your character!

Inuzuka, Kiba:

**Age: 24**

**Height/Weight: 5'5"/170 Ibs**

**Origin: USA/ State of Florida**

**Appearance: Brown hair that is worn in a bed-head style. Brown eyes. Darkly tanned skin. Two identical tattoos of upside-down, red triangles on each side of his face. He wears a black sweatband around his forehead. His canine teeth are overly sharp due to a genetic deformity. He is relatively short and lightweight. Built for speed. He is often mistaken for a younger child.**

**Background: Born in a family owned estate in Northern Florida. Grew up in a family that bred large breed dogs for a living, and was often compared to a dog himself due to his wild nature. He lived out in a more forested, secluded area with his family. When he was 15, his sister's dog was attacked by a rabid raccoon. The dog bit her while it was receiving medical care, and she attacked him in a bout of disease-born lunacy. He killed her with a hunting rifle. He shot his parents when they attempted to call the police and fled in fear of being caught. He left the country for a few years, and got involved in drugs while in Mexico at the age of 16. He was arrested for possession. He was out of jail in a year, and soon after his release, he found a dog that looked exactly like the one that he blamed for ruining his life. Instead of killing it, he smuggled it back into the U.S. with him out of repentance to his sister.**

**Cause for Insanity: Fear of being caught**

**Current Location: Somewhere in Colorado**

**Family/Relations: Dog (Akamaru)-this dog is with him at all times and is his only faithful companion.**

**Personality: He is bubbly and energetic, like a puppy, and is extremely competitive and loudmouthed during any sort of competition. He is a fighter by nature, and will take great offense if you mention his small stature. He's almost always got a grin on his face and rarely, if ever, holds a grudge for anything. He feels no shame, but will get embarrassed if a pretty girl is involved. He believes himself to be a "miniature model of a Casanova."**

**Special Skills: Anything that can be shot. Guns, bow and arrow, slingshot; perfect aim, disguises, and agility**

* * *

1. Alright, I hope this wasn't too risque for you all. I really struggled with writing this the right way for a long time, and I've finally gotten it to where I like how it came out. This chapter was over the course of just 15 minutes, and the next chapter will be the continuation of this one.

2. The sign language thing is true! It is not a universal language. Speaking of languages, the things Gaara says are a very rough translation of "Get off of me" and "sister". If you actually speak this language and you see that I wrote anything incorrectly, please send me a review and let me know the proper way. Oh, and deaf people can speak and vocalize. Being deaf does not affect your vocal cords, and seeing as how Gaara was not born deaf, it is highly possible that he'd be able to speak to an extent, even if it is a bit strange sounding. His breakdown is important too.

3. Let me know if you think I should up the rating because of this, alright? I don't want to get in trouble. No negative comments please. Be polite!

R & R if you want to read the conclusion to this chapter, Love AMB11!


	7. Not Yourself

Fell off the face of the earth for a while there, and I have no doubt it'll happen again soon. Both my folks just lost their jobs, we lose our house within the next six weeks, and it's my 16th birthday tomorrow. ...Woot...

Just remember that AMB11 loves you all and that I'm trying my hardest, so please keep up the positive reinforcement. It means a lot.

Disclaimer: I do NOT own any part of Naruto, just my own little section of the fan-verse that I enjoy playing with in my limited free time.

I got a request for Menma... Here you go people. *Insert evil laugh here.* ...mwahahahaha! I had to!... Okay, I'm done now.

Kinda gruesome this chapter, but I really like it. Disturbing... That's what happens when Menma makes an appearance. Angst party fun time!

I'm just writing random crap right here to see if anyone actually reads this mess... Laddidadidaaaaaaa! I like pie, but cheesecake is the ultimate dessert. Naruto is cool, so is Black Butler and a bunch of other random animes. Ooh! My favorite is Sakamichi no Apollon. Such a sweet ending! I wonder if anyone will actually read this... Fluffinmuffin the kitten king demands you do! *Sigh* I make MYSELF worry sometimes y'all.

**Okay, some of you are probably confused! I just took down chapter 8 right after putting it up, right? Well, I actually decided to combine 7 & 8 since they were really the same chapter originally. I convinced myself it was a good idea to split them, but hey, I'm a girl. I change my mind a lot. So 7 & 8 have been combined! This is now, chapter 7!**

* * *

Chapter 7: Not Yourself

It was almost addictive, the scent of blood mixed with a small splash of bleach wafting up into the air from the tile floors that had been mopped earlier in the day. No, not almost. To Naruto, it was addictive; highly.

He inhaled again, his upper lip curling upward to reveal slightly pointed canines. His eyes flashed with a tinge of red from far beneath their normal shade of azure, and Naruto licked his lips. The girl, no scratch that, young woman squirmed a bit in her obviously uncomfortable position. There was only another moment's hesitance before Naruto finally fought back the urges that fought to overwhelm him.

He blinked one last time, slowly. "Are-Are you alright?" Naruto's voice cracked lightly when he finally felt his ability to speak return to him.

She seemed delirious, or at least far gone enough to not be able to meet his eyes. He felt a ping of disappointment at the fact; she had beautiful eyes. _'Especially with the red liquid dripping with such perfect fluidity from that cut above them- No!' _"Get it together man." Naruto took a deep steadying breath and got down on his knees in front of the dark-haired woman.

Her forehead was unnaturally cool against the backs of his fingers despite the red, almost feverish, flush that occupied the space underneath her endless eyes. Another drop of red slid down the bridge of her nose, and Naruto felt a shiver run through her slack body.

"Can you tell me your name?" He checked her pulse; weak, but still there. His fingertips brushed the collar of the burnt orange t-shirt that was stained red around the right shoulder, and he inwardly felt a sickening feeling of pleasure that this mysterious woman was wearing his color. Her feet were bare beneath the scratchy grey slacks that were practically shredded from the knee down and held up tightly by a beige cloth belt. Naruto felt a deep relief that she hadn't been... violated.

"Hin-" She faltered, but swallowed thickly and adjusted her right arm, which was quite obviously broken. "Hinata."

"Alright Hinata. I'm Naruto, and I'm here to help you." Naruto settled the fingers of his right hand under her knees and used his left to gather her into his arms. He rose from his crouch, his knees popping loudly in complaint from the sudden move. Hinata whimpered a bit at being jostled, and her lower lip was caught tightly between her teeth, but the tears in her eyes were too stubborn to fall. "Shhh, it's gonna be alright Hinata." His voice suddenly seemed louder in the confines of the bathroom stall.

There was a rattle deep inside the building that shook the ground beneath his feet just hard enough to cause worry. A feminine scream echoed up from some lower floor of the building.

"W'ts goi'g 'n?" Hinata's voice was muffled through her pain and a face full of his t-shirt.

"We've gotta get outta here, and now." He adjusted Hinata a bit in his arms to reach for the wire in his ear. There was a moment of static as he opened the line, the only other sound the gentle thunk of his heavy boots as he hurried out of the women's restroom and out into the corridor.

_"What now? Kiba's already set off the first detonation like you asked. Have you any other demands your Majesty?" _Naruto just rolled his eyes and fought back the animalistic urge to destroy something in his frustration.

"Yeah, as a matter uh fact I do Pin-Head. Have a medical team on stand-by fer when we get back to the comp'ny. We got a bit of a cas'ulty I just can't leave behind." His drawl was particularly thick, which usually happened when he was at risk of having an attack. He took another deep breath and forcibly exhaled slowly through his nose just as he saw Sasuke step out of a side room. The raven's eyes went wide at the sight of him, or maybe it was the bloody and battered woman in his arms. You never knew with the Uchiha.

The communicator in his ear buzzed and then clicked off. Shikamaru had signed off without a word. Naruto took that as a silent agreement.

Sasuke's hands had found their way into his pockets, but he otherwise hadn't moved from the angrily-hunched over posture he'd had when he'd stepped into the hallway. Naruto felt a small snap in the back of his head, and the weight in his arms suddenly didn't feel quite so heavy. The sweaty palms of his hands started to unnaturally itch. _Crap._

"Can't get 'im to talk, can you? Figures the pretty boy with his fancy little hypnotic powers can't do jack around here." Sasuke's eyes widened at the change in Naruto's demeanor and he opened his mouth to say something, but he was interrupted by the aloof and dangerous smirk that contorted the tall blondes face. "Hold this, and be careful. I think she's hurt real bad." Sasuke felt his shoulders complain when Naruto effortlessly dumped the semi-conscious girl into his arms. The blonde stepped away from the confused young man and into the open room beside him, shutting the heavy oak door once he'd disappeared behind it.

Sasuke narrowed his eyes at the injured young woman he'd been stuck holding. She met his gaze for just a moment, and then fell still and limp in his arms. The young Uchiha sighed, the corners of his lips turning upward into a very slight smile while he stared at the heavy door in front of him. "Hate to be stuck in there right about now."

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Hidan's lungs burned from exertion, every joint in his hands ached, and his spine was twisted in an unnaturally painful direction. Blondie knew torture.

"I already told you every damn thing I know. I swear by my god that there isn't anything else I can tell you." Another vertebrae in his neck popped loudly and he actually winced. This was beginning to hurt.

Menma's face was beginning to cramp, smiling so wide could potentially be dangerous. His head ticked to the left slightly and his tongue darted out to lick his parted lips. His strong fingers clutched Hidan's wrist and bent it back at a specific angle, and the silver-haired albino all but screamed in agony. Menma's laughter was drowned out by the long stream of swear words that filtered out of Hidan's mouth.

"I think you just broke something damn it!"

Menma tsk-ed quietly in response, his grin widening far beyond the point of comfortable beneath his shimmering red-blue eyes. "That'd be against the rules. Now, if I wanted to 'break somethin' I'da done so a long time ago my friend. Do you doubt it?" Menma clutched the restrained man's chin in a tight grip. "I'm just havin' a lil fun 's all. My blonde friend here never lets me play any more." His fox-like eyes flashed between colors again as he looked over the pale face of his captive.

"Who the hell are you?" Hidan set his jaw to keep the quiver out of his voice.

"My name isn't of worth to you, honestly. I don't really even exist outside of myself. Confusing, I know, but it is what it is."

The door to the office creaked open and Sasuke crept into the room, light as ever on his feet. "We need to move. The detonator on the floor below us is scheduled to go off next and we don't want to be around when it does." He averted his eyes from the painful pretzel Naruto had turned their captive into.

"This was beginning to get fun. I was hoping I'd at least get to see a little bit of blood, how disappointing." Menma leaned in closer to the albino's ear. "I bet it'd be beautiful, the red dyeing that paper colored flesh. Nothin' like it." He blew out a hot breath in a chuckle and backed away towards the door.

He stepped into the hallway and felt the tearing in the back of his skull as Naruto fought to reassert himself. Menma nearly went cross-eyed at the pain, but an incessant buzzing sound in his ear split the barrier between personalities, and he reestablished momentary control. He picked up the call on the communicator.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

Her head hurt. _Hurt. _What a strange word. Did she know what it meant? _No, _she thought, _not_ _really_. Hinata just knew that it applied to her in some way, she'd heard the blonde angel say it to his friend just moments ago, and if an angel said it, then it must be true.

Hinata rolled her eyes behind closed lids and felt her face twitch at the intensity of the pain that shot all throughout her entire body. _Pain. _That was a funny word too.

She blinked the best she could, and decided that maybe trying to move wasn't the best idea she'd ever had. It wasn't like she was trying to think rationally anyways. Hinata tilted her head to the side and felt something cool and hard against her cheek. Was she on the floor? This situation was bringing about too many questions.

"Are... You... Wake?" Hinata cracked her lids open, shut them at the brightness of the obviously fluorescent light above her head, then slowly opened them again. This person was most certainly not her angel, more like a demon with a baby face. Well, if baby faces could be pierced. There was a fuzzy shock of red above the young face that was hovering above her. Could hair really be that red naturally? Great, more questions.

"Hnnnnn..." She blinked again and her vision cleared. "Sorta." The young man looked confused for a moment, but then a brief flash of recognition flickered across his face, and his shoulders relaxed a bit.

"I... See..." His speech was slow, slower than hers even, and it came out slurred and forced. His accent was strange too. The deepness in the tone and the slight grit it held didn't seem to match his apparent age, but he could be older than he looked.

"Who are you?" His small, long-fingered hand rested at the spot between her shoulder blades, the calloused thumb rubbing slow and calculated circles. Hinata slowly picked her aching head up off of the ground and rested it on the strange adolescent's knee, her own legs automatically curling up to her chest.

"Sabaku..."

"Sabaku?"

"Sabaku... Gaara. Called... Gaara."

"So you're foreign then?" His hand froze on her back, but his gaze didn't move from the hole they'd been burning into the plain white wall across from them. The light overhead was reflecting brilliantly off of the beige tiles on the floor, but it didn't seem to bother Gaara in the slightest. A door somewhere down the corridor slammed shut and a male voice flowed down the hallway, the words too muffled to make out. "What country are you from?"

"No... Understand." Gaara brought his hands up in front of his chest and popped the knuckles of his fingers before slowly speaking again. His fingers tapped on the legs of his black pants in anxiety. "What... name?" He helped her sit up and lean back against the wall, then pointed a single finger at the center of Hinata's chest.

"Hinata."

"Arm?" Hinata secretly wondered how he managed to turn a simple three letter word into about six different syllables. She was foreign too, but even her knowledge of the English language wasn't as bad as this kid's was.

"I don't know what happened Gaara. I just woke up, and someone was staring at me. Then everything started to hurt, and I blacked out, and-" Tears formed in her eyes as she realized she was lying to a person that she'd just met. He hadn't even done anything to hurt her, he'd just sat there and talked-she used the term loosely- with her. God, she was an awful person.

"Too... fast." She propped her good hand on his shoulder and he led her to her feet. She stood shakily for a minute, regulating her breathing. "Others... Wait."

"I don't know what's going on here." He took her hand in his slightly larger one and began to walk with her down the hall at a slow pace, the only sound being her pained, ragged breathing and the even footsteps of his heavy boots. "Tell me what's going on! Please. I'm so confused."

"Everyone die... soon. We... leave. Safe... Protect you... Come..." His grip on her arm tightened as they rounded the corner.

Hinata really didn't feel as if she had a choice in things anymore. It's not like she had in the first place anyway.

. . . . . . . . . .

His grip on her wrist was tight, but not painfully so. For such a young man, he sure had strong hands; rough too, but in a not entirely unpleasant way.

"Where am I?" The redhead that was leading her down the hallway didn't even turn to face her, even though it was the third time she'd asked the question. Another throb of pain seared across her eyes as the pair walked underneath yet another overly-bright florescent light. Hinata was really starting to feel pissed off at being ignored.

"Young man, please answer me. What's going on?" Unconsciousness tugged at her pain-fogged mind, but she pushed it away and kept up the slow hobble she'd been managing for the past several yards.

The redhead suddenly stopped in front of an open doorway, and he peered inside momentarily before simply dragging the injured girl in behind him. The door slammed shut loudly.

"Finally, another person! Would you please tell me what's going on here? He won't say much of anything." Hinata slumped into one of the two large armchairs in the room, cradling her broken wrist to herself gingerly. Her almost-white eyes flew about the room, taking in her somewhat dimmer surroundings before settling on the dark-haired man that was leaning on the sole desk in the room, which appeared to be an executive office.

"You got him to talk? Impressive." Sasuke tucked a few loose strands of his hair behind his ear and lazily cocked his head to one side.

Gaara made a few motions with his hands, and the raven's red eyes just rolled slowly in a full circle. "You know I don't understand sign language you idiot." The redhead's middle finger flipped upwards, his black-lined eyes narrowed in an annoyed glare. Sasuke chuckled quietly, "Now that I understand."

A scream echoed from next door, followed by another, a loud crash, and then momentary silence.

Hinata's lower lip quivered, the horrific sounds still echoing loudly in her ears. "W-what was t-that?" Someone laughed, more like bellowed and began hollering. There was a second crash; one more shriek of agony that slowly faded away into nothing. There was a faint buzz from the air-conditioning unit in the wall.

"Dear God, he's a monster." The third horrendously loud boom of the night echoed throughout the building, and Sasuke had to hold onto the desk with one hand to keep from falling over in the aftermath. "Shikamaru!" The wire in Sasuke's ear buzzed with static when he pressed the button, but the pony-tailed technician didn't pick up the line. "Dammit. We were supposed to be out by now."

The Uchiha knelt down in front of Hinata and rested his elbows on her knees. He wrapped a tight layer of gauze around her injured arm, and then sighed heavily. "Hurry it up Nara, before Naruto has too much fun by himself while I'm stuck on babysitting duty."

The Hyuga heiress huffed, and Gaara just glared out the window.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

_"What do you mean you've changed the directive?" _Menma felt his left eye twitch.

"I mean, Uzumaki-san, that I've just discovered something about a certain Mr. Yugakure that you may enjoy." Orochimaru leaned back in his chair and adjusted the angle of the viewing device on his computer so that his hidden camera could see the blonde's face when it went mysteriously expresionless.

_"Explain, Snake." _Menma's lips moved slowly against the microphone that he'd pulled from his throat.

Orochimaru chuckled quietly to himself. He rather liked the nickname. "It appears that Hidan knows a little more about my company than I'd like him to." Well, it wasn't a total lie.

There was a hiss of static, and the camera blanked out momentarily only to flicker back into view a second later. Orochimaru toppled backward from his chair and hit the ground with a solid thump, his purple-painted eyes glued to the screen as he heard the simple response echo repeatedly in his mind as it slipped from between the lips forming the alarmingly monstrous grin completing the spine-chilling expression on the blonde's face.

_"Understood." _Menma laughed.

. . . . . . .. . . . . . . . . . .

The chair leg broke easily enough despite the slick blood that coated Menma's hands. Why wouldn't the man die already? What, was he immortal or something?

"Feh." Menma slung the broken chair against the wall and it splintered with a booming crash. "This isn't as much fun as I thought it would be. I prefer to hunt my victims, having them offered to me just takes away the sport of it all." He plucked a small sliver of wood out from under his thumb nail.

"If you let me go, I'd gladly run the hell away from you." Hidan blew a stray strand of white-silver hair from in front of his reddish eyes and grit his teeth in pain when the blonde threw the broken chair leg at him. He felt another rib break.

"Do I really look that stupid?"

"Kind of, yes." In a really crazy sort of way. Hidan felt another round of pain when Menma kicked him in the jaw with his heel. His face hit the carpeted ground, and the skin of his cheek felt burnt. "Kinda look like a crazy-ass kid on Halloween."

Menma landed another solid kick in the back of the man's head before twisting his neck painfully to the side. Hidan screamed out, his vision going black, but the blonde released him before he could slip into blissful unconsciousness.

"What the hell's your problem you psychotic-"

Menma snapped his arm, and Hidan's rant petered out into a strangled cry of pain.

"I thought you weren't supposed to leave evidence!" Menma picked the man up, including the chair he was tied to, and held him up off of the ground by the front of his shredded shirt. The blonde launched the chair into the same wall he'd broken the armchair against, except the more sturdily-made desk chair, and the man it was restraining, remarkable stayed in one piece.

Menma laughed, a hoarse, throaty sound that spilled from his plump lips. He stared down at the broken man in front of him with eyes as red as the blood his hands were covered with up to the elbows. A few thick drops dripped from his fingers to the carpet below.

He picked the man back up and looked him in the eye, Hidan's face falling. Gone was the cocky and angry smirk and glare. Fear sparked in his eyes as the blonde smiled psychotically at him. Hidan's lip trembled. "Please."

"Orders," Blue flashed in the crimson eyes and the lines around the blonde's wide-stretched lips softened just a tad, "Are orders."

The window crashed as it broke, and Hidan's scream of fear faded into the wind.

Naruto fell to the ground, tears slipping down his red-stained cheeks. "What have I done?"

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

"Nara, what the heck happened?"

"I'm not sure. The line went dead momentarily and I had absolutely no access to any of the cameras in the building. It's back up-line now, so it may have just been a malfunction."

"Where's our ride?"

"Coming up with it now. Be prepared to jump Uchiha."

"Yessir." The line clicked off.

Hinata swallowed nervously. "J-jump?" She turned to the redhead. Gaara nodded slowly.

. . . .

"Is she alright?" Naruto opened the door slowly and stepped into the room, frosty wind from the open window whipping his hair from his eyes. He tightened the band around his forehead and scanned the room for the young woman he'd found.

His black, long-sleeved shirt was missing, his torso only covered by a red-stained white tank-top. He'd tightened the gear belt that was holding his black cargo pants up, and the only remaining blood on him was caked in his matted hair and under his fingernails. Naruto's skin was still stained a raw pink.

"She'll live, but she passed out again. I think she's running fever, but it's probably from shock." So he'd knocked her out when she flipped, it wasn't like the redhead could actually _tell _on him! The blonde nodded and stepped over to the window. He couldn't see the ground through the thick layers of smoke pouring out of the building from down below.

"Is Shikamaru coming for us any time soon?" The ground violently shook underneath them for the fourth time, and dust began to fall from the ceiling above. Smoke billowed out of the broken windows from the floors all around the building, and Naruto had to step away from the hazardous air drifting into the room.

Hinata coughed in her sleep, her face caught in a pained grimace.

Sasuke steadied himself, a crease of worry marring his brow. "He'd better, the next one is just down the hall, and I have no desire to be blown to bits today."

"Or any day for that matter." Naruto smiled and collected the light woman into his arms.

Something broke through the thick fog of smoke and the three conscious men in the room stepped up to the opening of the window. "So," Naruto glanced left then right, "Who goes first?"

Gaara jumped.

. . . .

"You are a licensed pilot, right Shikamaru?"

Sasuke landed on the edge of the helicopter, and Shikamaru hit a switch before taking off and away from the burning building.

"Eh, close enough."

"Good enough for me." Kiba swung around in his seat, an over-sized communication headset crammed over his naturally matted brown hair. He pressed a large button on the side of them and something squealed in protest.

"Would you take that off, you idiot. It keeps interfering with my navigator." Kiba slid the headphones off of his head with a sad frown and spun back around in his chair.

Naruto helped Sasuke get fully into the seat in the back of the helicopter, Hinata still cradled to his chest. Gaara swung his feet, angry that they still didn't touch the ground.

"Does anyone want to tell me why the company leader isn't with you?" Kiba glanced over his shoulder, and instantly wished he hadn't.

It was quiet, uncomfortably so, until Naruto broke it with a cough. "My orders were... Altered. He was not to accompany us back."

"Aa." Kiba turned back around, and the rest of the trip back to the airport was silent except for the steady thrum of the helicopter wings and the occasional bang as the building collapsed far behind them. It was sure to be on the news by morning.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

"Gently now, we don't want to wake her. Alright, thank you sir. She's in good hands now." Naruto's eyebrows lowered, and his hand still held tight to Hinata's shoulder even as she lay in the bed in the small nurse-bay of the private jet.

His grip subconsciously tightened on the shirt the nurse had put on her while he'd stood with his back turned for privacy. He ran his eyes over the sleeping girl and felt a wave of pity rush over him. She'd be fine, but it would sure be hell for her for the next few days. In a way, he forced his fingers to release her, he felt like he was... responsible for her. She'd seen him first. Naruto shook his head slightly, they didn't owe each other anything.

The petite nurse sighed tiredly and smiled in exasperation. She nodded slightly towards the door that led back to the seats. Naruto stiffened despite himself.

"Fine. Get me if she wakes up then." Naruto pushed his way through the small team of medics and back out into the main aisle of the jet. It was only a twelve hour ride, no worries. He dug his thumbs into the flesh between his eyes.

"Naruto! Get over here, we were going to share some stories until we have to pick up the rest of the team." The blonde smiled.

"Alright, who's going first?" Naruto fell back into his seat and reclined, letting the heat from the vent above caress his face.

"You." He cracked a blue eye open and glanced around and shook his head slowly.

"No way Jose, I'm bushed. Maybe after a nap." He winked at the group and closed his eyes again, a faint smiled painting his face.

"Then translate for the kid then, none of the rest of us can understand him. I bet he knows quite a few, his culture is famous for its' history." The raven rolled his eyes behind his glasses, his voice drier then Cairo had been. Sasuke crossed his legs and turned the page of his book. Kiba nodded enthusiastically.

Naruto sighed, but sat up anyway and signed, 'Will you tell them a story if I translate for you?'

The redhead simply nodded and cracked his knuckles to begin. He knew the perfect tale to tell.

End Chapter 7

. . . . . . . .

Aburame, Shino:

Age: (Suspected) 20-25

Height/Weight: 5'11"/180 Ibs

Origin: Unknown

Appearance: Brown hair, trimmed short. Eye color unknown. Fair skin. Head covered entirely by a hood at all times. He wears reflector goggles and passes himself off as a blind person with a cane in most situations.

Background: Unknown. Has been arrested 6 times for larceny in 6 different states in the U.S. Every prison burned down after all the convicts escaped.

Cause of Insanity: Dislike of anything that bugs him and desire to take things from people he doesn't like

Current Location: Unknown

Family/Relations: (Deceased)

Personality: Little known. Enjoys nature and hates big cities, often destroying various things in them. He likes the feeling of taking something from someone, that fits a certain profile that only he knows, just so that they can't have it. He doesn't talk much, but his speech is very polite and refined, suggesting that he is either a proper person by nature or that he is disguising an accent. Personally, he enjoys being a criminal.

Special Skills: Larceny and theft

* * *

1. Much better now! I'm much happier with this. The next one will be a bit of a filler, but it'll be a fun one, I guarantee it!

2. I wanna see at LEAST 10 reviews for this before the next chapter comes out. Just because you love me and want to brighten my day ;)

3. Also, I have the basic plan for next chapter plotted, but if you have anything you feel you'd like for me to try to incorporate, leave it in a review and I'll see what I can do. I'm interested in what you can all think of. (Hint: Read back on Gaara's history, because it's going to be a slight elaboration!)

Bye for now! Love AMB11!


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